The new iPhone developer agreement which Apple posted yesterday has caused a bit of a stir in the development community. Due to the wording, it is currently unclear whether or not certain development platforms will be able to continue delivering iPhone apps — most notably affecting companies like Adobe, Appcelerator, and Unity3D.
The first response to this change was put out yesterday by Appcelerator. On the developer blog, Jeff Haynie notes:
We know that you put a lot of trust in Appcelerator and effort into your applications. You have our commitment that we will do everything possible to ensure that Titanium remains the outstanding platform for cross-platform application development for years to come. We will update you with more information as soon as we gain a clearer understanding of today’s announcement.
I encourage you to read the entirety of the post, which is wholly calm, positive, and professional. Now compare that with a post on The Flash Blog today from Lee Brimelow:
What is clear is that Apple has timed this purposely to hurt sales of CS5. This has nothing to do whatsoever with bringing the Flash player to Apple’s devices. That is a separate discussion entirely. What they are saying is that they won’t allow applications onto their marketplace solely because of what language was originally used to create them. This is a frightening move that has no rational defense other than wanting tyrannical control over developers and more importantly, wanting to use developers as pawns in their crusade against Adobe.
Not only is Brimelow’s post speculative, but the tone is combative and flat-out unprofessional. It sets the stage for a fight. It assumes full insight into Apple’s intentions and practices. Brimelow concludes with:
Now let me put aside my role as an official representative of Adobe for a moment as I would look to make it clear what is going through my mind at the moment. Go screw yourself Apple.
Simply put, if I were in Adobe’s shoes, I’d be looking for a new evangelist. This is not the tone I would want — or accept — coming out of my company. Yes, there are a lot of people at Adobe working hard to make Flash apps work on the iPhone — and Apple’s change in legal wording yesterday could have been perceived as a direct attack at those initiatives — but we are not children here. If a startup like Appcelerator, with only a handful of employees, can produce a cohesive, mature response to a new corporate challenge, surely so can an enterprise company like Adobe.
