As part of the 3GSM World Congress in Barcelona, ​​Adobe announced that the video will be included in Flash Lite 3, the next version of the Flash runtime environment for mobile phones. Licensees will be able to purchase the new software in the second quarter of the year, and Adobe expects consumers to see it in action by the end of the year, as stated by Anup Murarka (director of technical marketing for mobile and devices at Adobe).
Incorporating video into Flash Lite will simplify the process of creating and distributing mobile video, while mobile operators now have to employ a special set of fragmented tools, according to Adobe.
According to Murarka, “the same video tools that are used to deliver Web content can now also be used to deliver mobile content.”
Although the number of users who watch video on their mobiles is still scarce, operators and entertainment companies are beginning to bet more on the new medium. Last week a division of Time Warner signed an agreement with Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson to use the technology in sending news and cartoons; while the North American operator Amp’d Mobile signed with several Hollywood partners to create exclusive programs for mobiles.
According to Murarka, with the next version of Flash Lite, operators and content companies will be able to use the same Flash server for mobiles as for Web video, as well as the same streaming protocol and the same encoding tools and processes. Videos will probably need to be resized to accommodate small screens, but should not be recoded again. It also adds that, thus, it will be easier and faster to publish the content for mobile devices.
According to Adobe, Flash Lite videos can be presented in a variety of forms, including streaming video, downloadable clips, and screensavers, as well as embedded in Flash-based applications.
Additionally, since video is part of Flash Lite, it will be easier to integrate with software that uses video, such as channel and playback selectors, forward and reverse controls.
Adobe has indicated that the number of mobiles that include Flash is over 200 million. This data includes both Flash Lite and FlashCast, a client-server platform that allows operators to send content to phones in the background, so that subscribers can use it even beyond the areas where there is coverage of the network. net.
