I just had a funny IM conversation with my friend who works at Googs, I sent him the link for the Flash globe from Poly9 that I just saw on MXNA. The description reads “Poly9 FreeEarth is a cross-browser, cross-platform 3D globe which does not require any download.” Turns out it wasn’t quite so easy :)

Doug McCune: http://freeearth.poly9.com/ eventually we’ll get google earth in flash

Google Employee: i don’t see anything when i go to the page

DM: ha. really? like nothing at all?

GE: doesn’t look like it’s ready for primetime. no earth

DM: well, so much for that then

GE: do you see anything?

DM: yeah, a spinning 3d earth

GE: using firefox? do you need flash 9?

DM: probably. it’s definitely flash player, probably 9

GE: hold on. geez, didn’t have to install anything my ass

DM: haha

GE: don’t have priveleges. hold on. god dammit

DM: haha, it’s not that cool, not worth the effort

GE: oh, i’m sure it’s not. i just want to show you how big a pain in the ass it is. i’ll tell you when i get it…

DM: I’m timing you. I’ll send the report to adobe

Google Employee disconnected

I assume this was a restart. He didn’t come back on IM though, so god knows. So while us Flash/Flex guys keep bragging about 80-90% flash player 9 penetration, we gotta still remember that we can’t claim that anything we make “does not require any download”.

4 Responses to “didn’t have to install anything my ass”

  1. Josh Tynjala says:

    In most cases (80-90%), it doesn’t. Sounds like “GE” just doesn’t like Flash ;)

  2. Eric cancil says:

    It really goes ape-shit when you drag it sometimes! hah.

  3. Nate says:

    That’s the problem that i have internally. All of the comps were imaged before Flash 9 came out. Since Flash 9 takes admin rights and not a single user has them they have to call up the company’s tech support the first time they view a flex app.

    pain in the aaaaassss.

  4. Greg Sadetsky (Poly9 CEO) says:

    Thanks for the review. I’ve put up an “Alpha 0.01″ badge at the top-right corner to let everybody know that we’re aware of such problems, and are working hard on them.

    Best from Quebec City.

    P.S. Feel free to contact me at greg for any questions.

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