So don’t expect Flash on the iPhone anytime soon.

The problem with Adobe is that they absolutely insist on using their tools for their online services. When you want to order anything online with them, you have to learn their stupid interface.

I saw the PayPal icon as I got to the laborious rubbish checkout system.

“Brilliant, I don’t have to go and get my credit card.”

Yes, the fact that I don’t have to leave my desk and walk 10ft to get my credit card has lost MasterCard and Visa the business. PayPal wins because I know my username and password for that.

I click Check-Out.

And this is where the shite happens.

Adobe’s bollocks Flash system isn’t at all happy handling the PayPal hand-off. It’s fine when you’re dealing with their own internal systems 100%. I have managed to pay with a credit card before — enough to have given them a good few thousand pounds over the years.

I saw the system send me over to PayPal. I logged in and approved the transaction and we handed back to the Adobe ordering system.

Which played a nice little timer at me for a minute or so then told me there had ‘been a problem with my transaction’ (or words to that effect).

Great.

This is a billion dollar company screwing up right in front of me.

Couldn’t they have got it right?

I don’t care what the problem is. I need the transaction to be frictionless. If there’s an issue with the credit card (my bank(s) routinely have trouble if I use my card anywhere other than within 3 miles of my registered address) then tell me. Prompt me. Let me know what’s happened.

I logged back into PayPal and found that 168 quid has been taken from my account and is pending. It’s been sent to Adobe. But it’s pending. Whatever the hell that means.

Well that’s useless.

100% useless because it’s interrupted my day and I’m now staring at weeks worth of bollocks to resolve it.

Best case I might magically get an email tomorrow morning from a concerned Adobe customer services employee to say ‘sorry about that and your order has been processed’.

Worst case I have to phone people. And explain shit. And try and get through to somebody who cares.

And I can’t be bothered. I don’t have time — I didn’t ever make the time for Adobe. I’m the one PAYING them the sodding money.

What’s interesting in this situation is that if you think I’m an annoyed customer, wait ’til you start doing business with the next generation. You’re going to love them. If you think I’m particularly intolerant to your billing and ordering system screw-ups, wait until you start doing business with today’s 14 year olds. You simply won’t get their money or their attention if you deliver service in this manner.

It’s the next generation of truly mobile, truly connected folk — the ones growing up to *rely* on Google and mobile connectivity — that are going to hammer these sorts of ordering systems.

As for me, do you remember the Richard Branson maxim of [something link] ‘give somebody bad service and they tell 10 people’?

Well, hello 250,000 Mobile Industry Review readers.

May I suggest that, for your next Adobe order, you think very carefully about purchasing with a credit card? I made the mistake of trying to use something that I’d never tried.

I’ll give it 24 hours and then I’ll start with the sodding drudgery of phoning to find out about my order.

MobiTween has been working with the world’s leading mobile operators, handset manufacturers, media companies and third party developers – developing and publishing mobile games using the Adobe Flash technology. The company brings 3 years of expertise to Zed, which has successfully established itself in 53 countries including some of Europe’s largest markets. Having the credit of being the leading mobile VAS player in terms of revenue and geographical coverage, Zed partners with 130 wireless carriers across the globe. Recently, in June, the company appointed Pedro Saudo as its new CMO.

CEO and founder of Zed group, Javier Perez, says:

This acquisition signals a very important milestone within our worldwide games strategy as Zed is committed to consolidating a global leadership position as developer, publisher and retailer of multiplatform games.

With this acquisition, Zed can now offer innovative solutions to build gaming portals offering the best gaming experience to the end consumers.

Congratulations Zed. Let’s hope they win even more fronts with this acquisition.

AIM Express sports tabbed IM conversations and text message mode – users can SMS anyone on their buddy list – and the apps works with all the major browsers, including IE, Firefox and Safari (what no Opera?)

AIM has had a spit and polish for Windows Mobile phones, and is now available for version 5 and 6 of the OS. While it’s not earthshattering, it’s good to see AOL looking after the service and tarting it up once in a while – and a Flash version makes a lot of sense for anyone who fancies an IM convo on their work phone without all the hassle of convincing the IT department to let them put software on the device.

Samsung’s making this software available for all the main mobile operating systems – Windows Mobile, Symbian, Linux – and it also works on other consumer gear that uses the same memory, like digital cameras and TVs.

If you thought Samsung was being generous and just giving us faster memory from the good of their hearts, think again – the company’s press release says that it should make it easier for electronics manufacturers to design in the new software to their products and so help Samsung memory make its way into more handsets and other gadgets. Cunning.

The partnership will see both companies create new development tools for programmers to make Flash-based applications using BREW, with a release scheduled for later this year.

So what does it all mean? In short, it looks like Adobe will be able to expand Flash capabilities further into lower end devices, while BREW devices will look spiffier with the ability to play Flash videos or enjoy other rich content applications. While everyone has one eye on the latest and greatest high end devices coming around the corner, it’s a sound move for Qualcomm and Adobe to work on keeping those with less feature-rich mobiles happy.

Adobe says the project is aimed at “enabling a consistent runtime environment — taking advantage of Adobe Flash Player and, in the future, Adobe AIR — that will remove barriers for developers and designers as they publish content and applications” across all handsets and other devices, and allow all mobile programming to be updated over the air.

Here’s the nuts and bolts of what Adobe will do:

– Removing restrictions on use of the SWF and FLV/F4V specifications
- Publishing the device porting layer APIs for Adobe Flash Player
- Publishing the Adobe Flash® Cast™ protocol and the AMF protocol for robust data services
- Removing licensing fees – making next major releases of Adobe Flash Player and Adobe AIR for devices free

Making it cheaper and easier for developers to write for a variety of mobile operating systems – what’s not to like?

The bridging technology will come in the form of an intuitive tool to create applications and allow “Flash Lite content to be encapsulated in Java ME applications”. Sony Ericsson has promised developers should be able to get their hands on the goodies in the second half of this year.

Microsoft’s Flash rival Silverlight came a bit late to this party and technology like this, which strengthens both the incumbent mobile platforms, won’t make it any easier for Silverlight to make its mark in the mobile world.

Or, the other way of looking at it is that the boss of the unit, who’s been at the company for 30 years has left and time was ripe for a reorganisation.

Whatever the motivation, there’s no denying it’s a smart move. Mobiles and PCs (and PC type devices) are only going to get closer as the industry moves away from the idea of mobile-specific platforms like .mobi and towards open access. If Adobe can replicate the same success with Flash on the mobile as it has with Flash on the PC, it’s laughing.

Microsoft has licensed Flash Lite “to enable web browsing of Flash Player compatible content within the Internet Explorer Mobile browser in future versions of Microsoft Windows Mobile phones”, says Adobe, and Adobe Reader LE software for PDF viewing for mobile devices.

Steve Jobs may have signaled he doesn’t much fancy Flash for the iPhone but it doesn’t look like Adobe is short of friends on this one – especially if it can persuade an archrival like Microsoft to use the technology on its own devices. I don’t think Microsoft will be feeling too bad about giving its competitor a push – after all, Flash is already on half a billion-odd devices. A few more Windows Mobiles won’t hurt.