Steve Jobs’ Flash Concerns Are Answered in Full by Adobe’s CEO [Shantanu Narayen Responds to Apple CEO’s “Thoughts On Flash”; We Love a Quarrel Between Giants]

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Just earlier on today we looked at Steve Jobs’ long press release / open letter in which he expressed various “Thoughts on Flash.” We expected Adobe to respond as fast as possible and it looks like the company has prepared a reply even faster than we could have hoped for. And we can always go for a little argument between titans so go get your popcorn ready.

The Wall Street Journal had a chance to talk to Shantanu Narayen, the CEO of Adobe, and he wasn’t particularly happy with Steve Jobs’ reasons for Apple not supporting Flash on the iPhone, iPod and iPad.

Narayen seems to think that Adobe is offering open content to developers. The whole Creative Suite software was meant to work on multiple devices and he claims that Apple “shows that they are concerned about Adobe being able” to offer such product that’s ready to work across multiple platforms.

It’s funny how Narayen kept referring more to CS5 than to Flash only. We know CS5 is available on various platforms, but, not wanting to defend Steve Jobs here, we have to remember his essay was entitled “Thoughts on Flash” not “Thoughts on CS5”.

While he said Adobe is certainly shipping on Android’s latest version, whether it’s Android 2.1 or Android 2.2, Narayen also concluded that Apple is putting up “a smokescreen” when talking about Flash and the App Store. Furthermore Adobe’s CEO accused Apple of restricting developers and forcing them to develop “two workflows” one for Apple and one for the others.

Steve Jobs blamed Flash for crashing Macs but Shantanu Narayen had a great answer for that by implying that if Adobe makes Apple crash that has something “to do with the Apple operating system.”

Adobe’s CEO also seems to think that Jobs is basically lying when saying that Flash is draining power from Apple’s devices and that “for every one of these accusations made there is a proprietary lock-in” which doesn’t allow Adobe to innovate.

These are definitely some very tough responses but then again it’s a tough business these CEO are involved in. Narayen believes that this multi-platform world, or Adobe’s world, will eventually prevail over Apple’s single-platform view.

And, in case it matters to anyone, Adobe’s CEO uses a Google Nexus One, at least for now, and Adobe is working on “dozens” tablet projects with other companies. So it’s pretty much safe to say he won’t be playing with an iPad. Wonder if he’ll ever buy one for someone close to him.

What do you say, folks? Whose side of the story do you prefer best? Apple’s or Adobe’s?