Another reason for the emergence of HTML5 is the Mobile Web. Using HTML5, mobile developers can create browser-based mobile sites that have a similar sophistication to native mobile apps. Let's look back at the past year of HTML5 innovation...

Probably the biggest champion for HTML5 is Google, which has a huge financial incentive to ensure that HTML web pages continue to be the dominant way to access the Web (some argue that apps will soon rule the Web, instead of the browser). Google's search and Adsense businesses rely a huge amount on HTML sticking around - and by extension, HTML5.

At the beginning of the year, Google showed off some impressive demos utilizing HTML 5.

Also in January, Google-owned YouTube began to support HTML5. This allowed videos to be viewed without Adobe's Flash player plug-in, which YouTube claimed would make videos load faster and enable developers to build new types of features. In July, YouTube launched a beta HTML5 embeddable player.

It's worth noting that despite these moves to support HTML5, YouTube still views Flash as a superior technology for its video service.

Google also highlighted HTML5 on the mobile phone, with the January launch of an HTML5 version of its telephony service Google Voice on the iPhone. This was prompted by Apple's refusal to approve a Google Voice app on the iPhone. As we noted in January, if it's a web site then there's nothing Apple can do about it. (Apple did eventually allow a Google Voice iPhone app into the App Store, in November)

Startups Using HTML5

2010 saw a number of startups try to differentiate their products using HTML5. Among the examples we reviewed were SublimeVideo (HTML5-based video player), Bitspace (online music player and backup service for your music files), Clicker (Internet TV guide), Handroll.tv (online video) and Vimeo (online video).

Most of the HTML5-enabled startups listed above are online video services. Indeed, a report in October by MeFeedia stated that about 54% of online video is now available in HTML5.

Even museums got into the act in 2010. In November, the National Museums of Scotland became the first major museum organization in the world to fully implement HTML5.

Next Page: Steve Jobs tears Flash a new one; and when will browsers fully support HTML5?

Apple vs. Adobe

One of the biggest controversies of the year was Apple's very public refusal to allow Flash technology on the iPhone and then iPad. Apple CEO Steve Jobs penned an open letter in April, explaining that Flash is a battery drainer and is otherwise unsuitable for mobile devices. "New open standards created in the mobile era, such as HTML5, will win on mobile devices (and PCs too)," concluded Jobs. He followed up in June with another withering attack on Flash, at the D8 conference.

To be fair to Adobe, it has put support behind HTML5 too. During its annual developer conference, MAX, in October, Adobe announced a new product for building HTML5 content and highlighted some of the advantages of developing in HTML5. Adobe Edge, as the new tool is called, will allow developers to easily create interactive HTML5 experiences.

There has been a lot of heated discussion this year about which technology is better: Flash or HTML5. The consensus among most people (other than Steve Jobs) is that HTML5 is the future, but Flash is still the default for interactivity in the browser.

Full Browser Support Not There Yet

With a new version of HTML on the way, browsers of course will need to support it. However that process has been surprisingly slow. The Web's governing body, W3C, has even admitted that HTML5 is not ready to replace Flash just yet.

According to Phillippe Le Hegaret, an official with W3C responsible for SVG and HTML specifications, the issue is getting HTML5 to operate the same in different browsers and using different video devices. He noted that HTML5 currently lacks a video codec and digital rights management capabilities. However, he expects the HTML5 specification to be "feature-complete by mid-2011."

In a browser test conducted by the W3C recently, Microsoft's IE9 browser performed very well - although there was some disagreement about the results.

Chrome Experiment Showcases HTML5

Perhaps the most impressive HTML5 demo we saw during 2010 was Google's partnership with indie music band Arcade Fire, in late August. Showing off HTML5 support in its browser Chrome, Google's "Chrome Experiment" showcased a number of HTML5 features - such as the ability to choreograph windows and synchronize music and video between them, use HTML5 for 3D rendering, rotating and zooming of Google Maps satellite imagery, and inserting animated sprites directly over satellite imagery.

In summary, it's been a big year for HTML5. In 2011, this technology will probably go mainstream as full browser support becomes available in about the middle of the year. Let us know in the comments your thoughts on HTML5 and its future!

Image credit: Justin Watt (via A List Apart)

Only for Windows and Linux So Far - OSX Crash Protection Coming in Firefox 4

This crash protection feature is not available for Mac OSX users yet. According to Mozilla, "the technology used for crash protection requires major changes to Firefox on Mac OS X." Crash protection will be available for OSX in Firefox 4, however. Mozilla also plans to add support for additional plugins in future Firefox releases.

While Mozilla didn't specify how often these plugins lead to browser crashes, Mozilla's Director of Firefox Mike Beltzner notes that "Firefox 3.6.4 will significantly reduce the number of Firefox crashes experienced by users who are watching online videos or playing games."

Crash Protection as a Default Feature in Modern Browsers

Crash protection is slowly becoming a standard feature for most browsers. Google's Chrome, for example, also protects users from plugin crashes by running every tab in a separate process and Apple has offered a similar crash protection feature since the release of Safari 4. Google also plans to ship a special version of Flash with its browser in the near future. This, according to Google, will allow the company to ensure that Flash works well in its browser and that users always run an up-to-date and secure version of Adobe's plugin.

"SLARToolkit is a flexible Augmented Reality library for Silverlight with the aim to make real time Augmented Reality applications with Silverlight as easy and fast as possible," says Schulte. "It can be used with Silverlight's Webcam API or with any other CaptureSource or a WriteableBitmap."

The SLARToolkit supports detection of multiple markers, both from simple black and white, and custom markers, and is based on the Matrix3DEx Silverlight library. The port to Silverlight is another important step for augmented reality, and could lead to the further expansion of AR both on the desktop and on mobile devices running Windows Mobile.

Earlier this month we saw Adobe Flash and AIR gain support on the Android Mobile OS, and Flash on the iPhone has been a recurring rumor since the device was first released. AR may not be the biggest mobile market, or a killer feature for mobile phones, but with the expansion of the ARToolkit to Silverlight, and the Flash support on Android, it has taken a big step toward wider exposure to more users.

SLARToolkit - Silverlight Augmented Reality 3D projection sample from Rene Schulte on Vimeo.

Silverlight allows the Bing Maps team to make the user experience far more fluid than Google currently can with its AJAX-driven mapping service. The Silverlight version of Bing Maps is also the only way to access Microsoft's Streetside images, the company's version of Google's Street View. Because it runs on Silverlight, Streetside offers a very fluid way of moving around the streets of the cities in the U.S. and Canada that the service currently supports. The Silverlight version of Bing Maps also allows users to seamlessly switch between maps, satellite images and highly detailed aerial photos. In addition, the Bing Maps Silverlight version also makes it easy to browse through user-generated PhotoSynth images.

Finding Treasure - Destination Maps

Destination Maps are an interesting addition to the Bing Maps Apps. With this application, you can quickly create a map of driving directions to a specific place to give to your friends. The interesting feature here is that you can choose different map types, all of which display simplified and easy-to-read maps: American, European, Sketchy and Treasure, which looks like a pirate map.

Events

Bing's new Local Events application displays the locations of local events on the map. The application allows you to filter events by type (concert, theater, museum. etc.) and date. Currently, the selection of events in the application's index seems a bit limited.

Bing Maps vs. Google Maps

Google, however, still offers a couple of features that Bing Maps doesn't offer. With Place Pages, for example, Google offers a better local search experience. Google also offers slightly better maps, especially if you are planning to walk or to take public transport.

If anything, though, the current competition between Google and Microsoft is driving the development of online maps forward. Chances are that some users won't be happy about the fact that the new version of Bing Maps works with Silverlight, but the plugin is easy to install and the results are worth the hassle of installing.

Filters

This visualization, while visually quite stunning, wouldn't be very interesting though, if Microsoft hadn't also added the ability to quickly narrow searches by relevant categories. If you search for 'digital cameras,' for example, you get the option to narrow your search by number of megapixels, optical zoom, or brand. Baseball players can be organized by position, team, or salary, and criminals on the FBI's 'Most Wanted' list can be organized by reward, citizenship, or the crime they are wanted for.

Overall, these visual elements can really make some searches a lot easier, especially if you are starting out with a broad category and you are trying to narrow your search down (try 'yoga poses,' for example).

As Stefan Weitz, Microsoft's Director of Bing, told us last month, for some queries, visual results are simply much easier to scan for users than simple lists of texts. At the end of your work with the visual search interface, however, you are still taken back to a regular Bing search.

Silverlight Only

Microsoft decided to use Silverlight as the one and only way to access the visual search feature. At this point, Weitz argued when we asked him about this choice, Silverlight is already widely installed on millions of computers and Microsoft decided that the experience will not degrade gracefully if you don't have Silverlight installed.

Useful or Just a Gimmick?

While Visual Search might look like a gimmick at first (and it definitely is an interesting visual feature), it actually turns out to be a very usual feature for most of the searches that currently support it. The range of searches that allow you to visualize the results is still somewhat limited, though Microsoft will surely add on to this list over time. If anything, this is yet another feature in Bing that Google doesn't offer yet. As Bing tries to position itself as a 'decision engine' and not just as a search engine, this is also another feature that will help Microsoft to make this distinction. Instead of a list of links, Bing can now offer a set of faster and more visually pleasing search results

Topics

Here is a list of current topics that will pop up Visual Search as an option:

• 100 heroes and villains
• Billboard's past albums
• Billboard's past songs
• Film legends
• Greatest movies
• Movies in theaters
• Popular books
• Popular celebrities
• Popular DVDs
• Popular TV shows
• Pulitzer winning fiction
• Top albums
• Top songs
• Famous People
• FBI's most wanted
• Popular celebrities
• US politicians
• US presidents
• US vice presidents
• World leaders

Reference

• Dog breeds
• Periodic table
• Travel destinations
• US politicians
• US presidents
• US states
• US vice presidents
• World leaders
• Yoga poses

Shopping

• Cell phones
• Digital cameras
• Handbags
• HDTVs
• New cars
• Popular books
• Popular DVDs
• Portable GPS
• Pulitzer winning fiction
• Top albums
• Top iPhone apps

Sports

• MLB players
• MLB teams
• NASCAR drivers
• NBA players
• NBA teams
• NFL players
• NFL teams
• NHL players
• NHL teams
• UFC fighters

When we went to TV.com and selected the March Madness link, it went to the CBS-hosted link mentioned above. It appears, at least in this case, that YouTube has perhaps a slightly tighter integration over CBS' own streaming video site offering. But there are a couple of perks that are also available no matter which path you choose. Going the YouTube route gives you quick access to CBSNCAATourney video clips. Choosing the CBS site offers a live Facebook status update stream similar to what CNN did during the presidential debates. So, either way, everybody wins.

Microsoft added a number of interesting new features to Silverlight, including multi-touch support, improved text quality, support for a number of new video codecs (including H.264), better 3D effects, and automated search engine optimization. Users can now also take Silverlight applications and run them outside of the browser and even offline. Out-of-browser applications will run in a secure sandbox mode, which makes installing the apps very easy. These apps will also be able to auto-update.

NBC Universal also announced that it will use Silverlight to power its online coverage of the 2010 Vancouver Olympic Games, which will include 720p HD streaming (interestingly, NBC doesn't seem to use Silverlight outside of its coverage of the Olympics).

You can find download links for the Silverlight 3 runtime, SDK, and documentation here.

Expression Blend 3 Preview

Microsoft also showed a preview of Expression Blend 3, its development tool for Silverlight and WPF applications. Among other things, Blend now makes it easier to create prototypes and then immediately take these and turn them into working applications. Blend 3 also now integrates directly with Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator, which makes prototyping in the application even easier.

Azure

Azure, Microsoft's cloud computing initiative, also saw some important updates today. Developers can now host their data on two U.S.-based datacenters, giving them the ability to store their data in multiple locations, while also enhancing performance by reducing network latency. Developers will now also be able to run applications written in non-.NET languages on Azure, thanks to the addition of support for FastCGI. Because of this, developers will now be able to run PHP or Ruby applications on Azure, for example. According to Microsoft, the final version of the Azure platform is still on track for a launch by the end of 2009.

Witness Qwitter, which I installed and removed within less than 24 hours. Not because the site's poorly designed - it's lovely. And not because the service doesn't work as advertised - but because the service works exactly as advertised: when someone stops following you on Twitter, Qwitter lets you know.

So I dropped Qwitter (no, the irony of that sentence isn't lost on me). I'm sure it's a valuable service for those mature and grounded enough to handle it - say, the Dalai Lama on a good day. But until I understand whatever force it is that compels me to dwell on the number of my Twitter followers (and Facebook friends, and FeedBurner subscribers, and...) I'll be staying away.

More Noise to Signal. You can follow Rob on Twitter; and follow ReadWriteWeb too @rww.

Now rumors are swirling that Microsoft may be ready to release Silverlight 2 as early as next Monday.

Due to a press release about a conference call to be given by Scott Guthrie, Corporate Vice President of the .NET Developer Division, rumors are swirling that Microsoft will be releasing Silverlight 2 as early as next Monday. Guthrie noted that Microsoft will make "a significant announcement related to Microsoft Silverlight," next Monday at 9 a.m. PT. It seems more than likely that the rumors could be true. A developer SDK for Silverlight 2 has already been sent out and Silverlight 2 Beta 2 was released months ago. Looks like Silverlight 2 might be ready to use.

Timetables and Changes

If the rumors are true, this would mean the timetable release for Silverlight 2 was a little off. It was expected by the Summer and it's clearly Fall right now. Nevertheless, a list of upcoming changes has been published, which will be important for developers using Silverlight to review.

However, none of these changes will be important if many don't use Silverlight or develop applications for the platform. So to the developers we ask, how are excited are you about Silverlight 2?

"Microsoft, meanwhile, said that during the Olympics, 40 million US to visitors NBCOlympics.com didn't yet have Silverlight installed."

NBC has already begun switching back to Adobe Flash for the start of the NFL season. Yet their efforts don't seem to be paying off at the moment with reports of video playback for the NFL season starter game being too horrible to watch.

Not a Good Look

We all know that at least 90% of computer users have Adobe Flash installed. It's easy to see why NBC would want to switch back. The partnership between Microsoft and NBC was likely more beneficial to Microsoft in the end. One of the downsides for NBC was that users tend to become either wary or lazy about downloading new extensions for a website. This is especially true if the website was working just fine with previous extensions only days before. However, with a rocky start to switching back, NBC online sports fans are probably wondering if it's even worth the effort anymore.

The convention site was built on top of SilverStripe, a New Zealand based open source content management system we reviewed last year. In the review, we noted that SilverStripe had great potential, especially for those who needed a CMS with more functionality than traditional blogging platforms, yet with less complexity than traditional CMS system. The fact that it worked so well under high load during the Democratic convention confirms our first impression.

SilverLight

Just like NBC did during the Olympics, the convention site used Microsoft's SliverLight platform to stream live and recorded video feeds, many of them in HD quality.

According to the DNC, the average web viewer had watched just a bit over 80 minutes of video by the end of the week. This seems to be in line with the Olympics, where the average viewer watched around 15-20 minutes a day of online video.

Just as with the Olympics, the fact that online video streams were available was not detrimental to traditional TV networks. Instead, the TV ratings for this year eclipsed those of 2004 by 54%.

What About the Republicans?

The Republican Convention has partnered with UStream to broadcast its speeches online. Also, the GOP convention site uses YouTube to stream its recorded videos, which does not have the same quality as the SilverLight videos the DNC uses.

On the other hand, though, most users don't have to install any specific software to watch the flash videos on YouTube, so it will be interesting to see what the statistics for the GOP convention web site are going to look like once they are released.

Short Attention Span

There are a number of other interesting bits of information in the data from NBC, including that face that the average time people spent watching video on the NBC site so far is under 15 minutes and was as low as 10 minutes on Friday. This is very much in line with how people use Internet video on other sites like YouTube. NBC did not specify how many viewers watched the live coverage and how many of them just viewed already recorded clips. Judging from this number, it would almost seem as if most viewers wither decided to mostly watch prerecorded clips, or that they did not stick around for the live coverage for very long.

But What About the Experience?

Over the weekend, we had quite some time to play with NBC's video player, and while the overall experience was good and the video quality was actually very good and the streams never stuttered once, the video player itself is a bit of a disappointment. Why, for example, is there no full-screen mode available?

Also, the much touted "Live Video Control Room," where you can watch up to 4 streams at a time, is pretty much useless because of the miniscule size of the videos. Also, as Chris Albrecht points out, the user interface and navigation of the site is often confusing.

Overall, though, it seems these Olympic Games will hopefully change the way TV executives think about online coverage. Clearly, the online coverage is not detracting from TV viewership and if anything, is enhancing the way people relate to the events, especially in a year where the large time difference and the time-delay of the TV coverage become such an important issue. While the overall numbers for online viewership are maybe not as high as some others expected, we will have to see what happens during the week now, where many viewers might start watching the online streams from work.

One of the most obvious ways the Web will be utilized with the Beijing Olympics is with online video coverage. In the US, NBC has teamed up with Microsoft Silverlight for 2,200 hours of live coverage. Meanwhile in China, Adobe has teamed up with a Chinese network.

Despite the geographical limitations, NBC is promising lots of 'new media' features in its Web coverage. These include:

• Users have the ability to watch whatever sport they want, unlike on TV where you get what the broadcaster dishes up.
• There will be 3,000 hours of "on-demand encores of full events and highlights".
• Users can switch between up to 4 live streams.
• Users will see the standard world feed that is sent to all broadcasters, so there will be no network TV commentators. Instead, the NBC expects to see bloggers "serve as play-by-play voices and analysts" (free talent!).
• Users will have access to statistics, biographies and other information.

As the NYT notes, NBC's coverage of the Olympics online is the culmination of NBC's "multiple-network strategy, which began in 2000 with the addition of CNBC and MSNBC to the mix." The upshot is that coverage of the Olympics becomes an on-demand, 24/7 experience -- although unfortunately not worldwide in NBC's case. This is possible because the "cyber-pipelines" infrastructure is largely in place now, in the US, to support such extensive online video coverage.

NBC's coverage online will be powered by Microsoft Silverlight and Windows Media player. CNET reports that Limelight Networks is being used to route the video streams to Internet service providers. NBC was originally planning to use Adobe's Flash, but CNET noted that NBC "was convinced by Microsoft earlier this year that Silverlight would allow it to stream more high-quality video than would have been possible using Flash."

It seems China's TV networks didn't buy that line, as Adobe has partnered with CCTV.com to bring Olympics online video to mainland China.

CCTV.com and Adobe Partner for Internet Coverage in China

Today, Adobe announced a partnership with CCTV International Networks Co, Ltd. to deliver Web coverage of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games to fans throughout mainland China and Macau. CCTV.com owns the online video rights to the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games for mainland China and Macau. CCTVOlympics.com plans to provide 5,000 hours of "on-demand protected streamed video content including full event replays, highlights, features, interviews and encore packages." This is made up of 3,800 hours of worldwide broadcast Olympic Games video and 1,200 hours of CCTV's own video.

Choosing Adobe as a partner, as with NBC and Silverlight, is a hint that Chinese Internet viewers can expect a rich interactive experience. The press release trumpets "an unprecedented Web experience created with Adobe Flex and delivered via Adobe Flash technology".

Unlike NBC though, CCTV is not eschewing commentators and replacing them with bloggers. CCTV promises "expert analysis from CCTV's Olympic media team". However it also will be diving into the social web via "social networking features that will enable fans to share aspects of their Olympic experience with friends."

Conclusion

The 2008 Olympics is set to be the first to have a mammoth online video presence. Up to 5,000 hours of coverage would be enough to satisfy even the most rabid of Olympics fan. What's possibly even more interesting to watch will be the performance of interactive Web technologies such as Silverlight and Flash in this coverage. Which one will end up better? Although I guess if you're in the US, you'll never know about Flash - and vice versa for the Chinese regarding Silverlight.

Further coverage from the RWW Network:

RWW: The Olympics Go Mobile

last100: Roundup: The most digital of all Olympic games is well underway

last100: NBC Olympics on the Go will allow (some) fans to download events to watch on their computers

Netflix Comes To Xbox

Earlier this week, Netflix subscribers got a nice surprise - they no longer need to save up for that Roku box to get instant access to Netflix movies on their TV. Instead, the new set-top box for Netflix is going to be one that many people already have in their living rooms: an Xbox 360. The partnership between Xbox and Netflix will be bringing a new "Watch Instantly" feature that will appear on Xbox later this fall. In addition, a "Live Party" feature will allow people to watch movies together over Xbox Live. Well, the coolness of that feature is debatable...but still, Netflix on Xbox? Did Microsoft just win the living room from Apple?

Deep Zoom Changes the Web

Bah humbug - another browser plugin. Is that what you think? Well, like it or not the Silverlight plugin is being pushed hard. It's going to be installed on millions of HP computers and it's going to power NBC's Olympics '08 website, so it's going to become hard to avoid installing this one after a while.

If you've been paying attention to Silverlight news, you know that one of the most remarkable things about it is its Deep Zoom feature. It's definitely the coolest. It initially received attention when Hard Rock debuted their Memorabilia website. Then there was the incredible Deep Earth site (which technically didn't use Silverlight's Deep Zoom, but instead uses Silverlight plus a custom-written component created in Visual Studio). Now we have a Silverlight Deep Zoomable image of Yosemite National Park. 70 photographers, GPS-enabled cameras, 10,000 high-res photos. The results let researchers study rockfall activity and help Yosemite search-and-rescue teams with their operations by providing detailed, zoomable maps of the rockfaces. Cool? Yes, definitely.

Live Mesh

This service is rapidly approaching coolness. Mac fans have complained there's no Mesh for them, but that's only a matter of time. In the past couple of days, we've seen Live Mesh open up to all and launch a mobile web site.

Via m.mesh.com you can see your stream of Mesh news, access your Meshified folders, and move your photos, videos, and other content from your mobile device into your Mesh, instantly making them accessible from any computer, anywhere. The Live Desktop (cloud storage) offers 5 GB, but you aren't limited to meshing only 5 GB - you can mesh as much as you want. Data will sync from device to device via P2P connections, but only 5 GB are stored online for access when you're away from a device you own. You have the option to configure which files are part of that 5 GBs. Oh, and it does Remote Desktop, too.

If you haven't been able to wrap your head around Mesh, yet, this video is a killer introduction. Here, Ori Amiga demos the native Mesh feeds, WPF applications using Mesh, a Silverlight client that supports working on and offline, a custom Facebook application that syncs Facebook photos with Live Mesh, and even a Mac client that sends photos to Live Mesh. Cool? You bet.

Ori Amiga: Programming the Mesh

Your guide to this video

• 10:53: Skip to this point to start seeing the best stuff
• 19:10(ish): The developer stuff continues until 19:10ish
• 19:40: WPF demo app Family Show
• 27:01: Silverlight App PhotoZoom running offline
• 33:08: Mesh connector for Twitter
• 34:35: Mesh connector for Facebook
• 36:45: Mesh running on the Mac - photo from Photobooth synced to Mesh almost instantaneously - to both PCs and mobile!
• 43:00: Opening/editing files directly from the cloud - the cloud will be a shortcut on your desktop
• 46:09: Viewing offline RSS feeds synced to Mesh in your RSS reader

Do these innovations change your opinion of Microsoft? Are you impressed, annoyed, neutral, upset, undecided? Let us know what you think in the comments.

Author Disclosure: I also blog for Microsoft's Channel 10. I'm not a Microsoft employee, just a technology fan. This is not a paid endorsement - these are personal opinions.

Where the Curl platform itself competes with Flex and Silverlight, Curl Nitro competes more directly with Adobe AIR, Mozilla Prism, Google Gears, and other applications that allow content from the web to run on the desktop while also providing asynchronous communication with various back-end services.

This recently released Nitro demo app called CurlGraph was designed by Manuel Lima, the founder of VisualComplexity.com (our coverage) and it allows you to visualize a circle of up to 128 friends from your Facebook account. By examining the ring of friends and the arcs that indicate the relationships between them, you can visualize what your personal social graph looks like.

Of course, in order to run the app, you'll need to have Curl Nitrol Beta RTE already installed. You can then download the app, CurlGraph, from here and the code from here (note: zip file).

When installing the app, the dialog box looks very familiar - much like Adobe AIR - and the process was just as easy. You login to Facebook via the app and then it will graph out all of your Facebook friend connections.

Fighting For the Desktop

While the app itself is an impressive way to showcase Curl's ability to support a visually engaging desktop application, the company itself is going to be up against some tough competition to gain a foothold on the desktop.

At the moment there's the popularity of Adobe AIR's desktop widgets to deal with, especially among early adopters and other enthusiasts, not to mention Silverlight and other players in the RIA game, including OpenLaszlo, NexaWeb Enterprise 2.0, Dojo, Altio Live, UltraLightClient and JavaFX.

Curl's best bet may be with their enterprise efforts or with their open source web services development kit (WSDK), shipped earlier this year as a part of the Curl Rich Internet Application Platform 6.0. But even then, they're up against Microsoft's Silverlight offering which was ported to Linux by some Novell developers as Moonlight.

Fighting big companies like Microsoft and Adobe isn't easy for a smaller shop, nor is competing against JavaFX and others in the enterprise. Yet that doesn't mean that Curl isn't trying. Curl's VP of Developer Relations, Richard Monson-Haefel, left a comment here on RWW not long ago which was very critical of Adobe AIR's security model, a subject recently noted by Adobe platform evangelist Ryan Stewart on his blog.

Stewart references a recent presentation by Ethan Malasky called Developing Secure AIR Applications, and then says that "security is one of the things that gets talked a lot about with regards to AIR and the team spent a huge, huge amount of time thinking about the security mode."   (Slides from the presentation are below).

If the Curl platform is truly more secure, then they may be able to find success in the enterprise space, an area which AIR and Silverlight are both trying to reach now. However, Curl will have to be up for the battle because those two companies have a lot more resources to fight aggressively for RIA marketshare.