Google will start blocking Flash content in Chrome this year

froggyboy604

froggyboy604

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Flash was an indispensable part of the web just a few short years ago. Attempting to browse without Adobe’s plugin would mean broken videos, menus, and plenty of frustration. However, Flash itself was never a great experience, and now most websites are moving beyond that. These days, Flash is mainly known for its disproportionate impact on performance and security flaws. Google is finally putting its considerable weight behind an effort to wean users off of Flash. By the end of this year, Chrome will no longer load Flash content directly. Instead, you’ll have to whitelist websites that run Flash.

Google calls this approach “HTML5 by Default.” Chrome has shipped with a bundled version of Flash player for several years now, and it will continue to do so. This was never an endorsement of Flash, merely a recognition of the security risk. At least by bundling the latest version with Chrome, users wouldn’t be running old and insecure builds. When Google flips the switch on this plan, that plugin won’t load automatically Flash content when you just happen across it. That’s only feasible because you see much less Flash on the web now.

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I feel Flash Blocking would work better as a browser add-on instead of forcing every user to have Flash blocked as the default option.

Flash block sounds like an annoying feature for people who play a lot of flash games on different websites, or view a lot of online videos from websites which still use a Flash video player.
 
I have flash block on firefox and love it.... so long as its kept up to date which it currently isn't >_<
 
I'm not using Chrome, so I don't care about this, but from my point of view, html5 is not ready yet. There are a lot of older mobile devices that don't support html5 and it's gonna be problematic for a few more years.
 
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lb said:
I'm not using Chrome, so I don't care about this, but from my point of view, html5 is not ready yet. There are a lot of older mobile devices who don't support html5 and it's gonna be problematic for a few more years.
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I agree HTML5 is not ready for all devices because there are a lot of older mobile devices, and computers which don't support HTML5, or can't run HTML5 video at a watchable playback speed without slowdown problems. HTML5 video seems to run slower than Flash video on computers with a slower CPU, and a slower video card. When I try to play HTML5 video on an old Windows XP computer, the video slows down a lot where there are pauses. But, the flash video plays at a decent frame rate.

A lot of smaller and older video sites still use Flash video, and it could take a long time to convert all the FLV and SWF flash video files to MP4, and other video file formats which are compatible with a HTML5 video player. I also read a post online on a forum which said it will take a lot of time, and money to convert the English and other language subtitles to work with HTML5 video.
 
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lb said:
Both DailyMotion and Vimeo are currently HTML 5-compatible.
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Crunchy Rolls desktop website is still only uses Adobe Flash, and it has no HTML5 video player. I think a lot of personal websites made in the 1990s like 1999 and early 2000s like 2005 which host their own video still use a flash video player and FLV video files to show their video.

Dailymotion, and Vimeo are not as big as YouTube, but both Dailymotion, and Vimeo are very popular websites compared to many other video sites on the internet.
 
I think it is a good idea to block flash... HTML5 is better now. However, I don't think they should be getting rid of it just yet, maybe wait a few more years. It being an extension would be better in my opinion.
 
I think a lot of Educational websites still use Flash Games and programs on its site to teach kids. NewGrounds is still mostly flash based for the games.

Blocking flash by default may make people who use Chrome for school sites, and flash games site not as good.
 
Demon_Skeith said:
I'm sure there are lot of old sites that will never even bother upgrading.
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I agree there would probably be a lot of old sites which don't bother upgrading to HTML5 animation, games, and programs on websites since it may take too much time, and money to convert a flash site to HTML5.
 
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