I was fairly excited about Silverlight when it was released for Mac. Primarily it meant that Netflix streaming was coming to our platform. I don’t know if the impending release of that compatibility (scheduled for by the end of the year), but Microsoft has released a new version of the browser plugin. It’s now up to version 2.
As a Flash competitor, Microsoft is naturally trying to play up the strength of its own product. For example, developers of Silverlight content can choose the language they wish to use. The competition is another reason I’m rather glad to see Microsoft entering this market. Flash has held what essentially amounts to a monopoly for too long. Their plugin is an unstable resource hog that I quite honestly dread being loaded because so many ads use it.
And speaking of Flash, it’s reached version 10. This latest version adds new features for content (and ad) producers naturally, but more importantly in my opinion is GPU acceleration because as I alluded to above, Flash can use any help it can get to reduce resource consumption. On the other hand, Adobe doesn’t have the same history of making products for the Mac platform, then discontinuing or feature downgrading that product. Choose your evil.
I dunno. I'm no lover of Flash, but isn't pulling for Silverlight over Adobe's offering a bit like, if you'll pardon the Biblical reference, trading the Assyrian Captivity for the Babylonians? I see no reason to be comforted by either, and rather hope that something divine comes along and smites 'em both!
I tried to get a hint up here once, that during the Olympics, MS Silverlight could be installed using Pacifist, and have anything but the actual player stripped out of it. It was pretty cool to get the benefits, w/o calling home all the time. Just my .02...