It’s quite an impressive demonstration which Adobe is using to directly prove that Steve Jobs and Apple wrong. Judging by the video, they might have successfully done that. One thing to note however is that the phone used by Adobe in this demo has performance capabilities much better than regular mobiles, so it would be somewhat unfair to compare it with the phones most of us carry today.

But it does beg a question on what should change: The mobile device or the web? Should device makers, including Apple, make higher performing devices to accommodate Flash or should the web completely move away from technologies such as Flash so that mobile users also get the full experience? One thing is certain, the mobile “web-war” is certainly far from over.

Now, it must be noted that there is no statement officially linking the suspected new website- Thisdayonline.net to Thisday Newspapers. It is possible that the design used on thisdayonline.net isn’t about to be their new homepage design or does not belong to Thisday at all. But the fact that Thisdayonline.com (the current main site) was  for a short time redirecting to Thisdayonline.net (as reported in Oo’s blog) is strong evidence that there are indeed plans to overhaul the homepage and this is a likely design round. That aside, there are two things that I have discovered to be very clear about Thisdayonline.net:

• it is powered by blogging CMS WordPress
• it uses a free theme called ‘the beeb’

There seems to be part of the problem already. I have nothing against using downloaded themes but if  an organisation the size of Thisday can’t develop their own unique design, it shows a huge lack of creativity on their part. I’m sincerely hoping that Thisday doesn’t go ahead and commission this “new” design just to save them the enormous embrassment, and possibly complaints, they will receive for stealing. The current Thisday website, to me, is an absolute mess. Incidentally, it was another design copy of what the CNN website looked like at the time Thisdayonline.com was launched. Perhaps they should learn from previous mistakes and decide against to ripping-off the design of another global news organisation.

I even stuck with my Nokia E61 and painfully resisted an upgrade to the sleek E71 just until I was sure which network will carry the N97 and at what price. Now that Vodafone has officially confirmed a July date, it appears my days with 3 mobile are sadly over. I had high hopes that 3 would have the N97 because they are a great network, but after all these months waiting and seeing mouth-watering reviews and product demos of the N97, I’m throwing loyalty out of the window.

Now, it’s just to hope Vodafone has a good pocket friendly deal.

Update (2 Sept 2009): Here’s a  review post describing my experience with the phone after two months