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We Google Watchers have been writing a lot of about the alleged Google Android Tablet, the answer to Apple’s iPad “Jesus Tablet.”
Now bloggers have seen it in action, thanks to Adobe, which showed off an Android tablet at Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco, held May 3 to 6.
The images and videos (and laughs) come courtesy of Zedomax, which scored this scoop, noting the device supports Adobe Systems’ Flash and Air.
See this video of the Google Android Tablet running the Wired magazine application:
The faux exuberance, which may actually be legit in a geeked-up way, is due to Apple CEO Steve Job’s swearing off of Adobe Flash and other cross-platform technologies.
Google and Adobe later confirmed that Android would support Flash, the ultimate riposte alliance to Apple’s snubbing of Adobe.
Zedomax editor Max Lee, who said he believes the tablet was running Android 2.1, wrote:
“It runs Adobe’s Flash and Air apps flawlessly. That was the first time I saw Adobe’s Air apps running on a tablet and [I was] totally impressed by how it ran. And now I can understand why Apple wants to ban Flash and other Adobe products completely from their iPhones and iPads, because it’s rather incredible technology.“
A little needle perhaps, considering the DOJ or FTC may sue Apple over its abandonment of Adobe, which many industry insiders see as an anticompetitive strike against the industry as a whole.
In any case, Zedomax’s point that he prefers an Android tablet to Apple’s iPad because it supports Flash is well met, and likely to be echoed by others who love Adobe, love Google or hate Apple, or some combination of all three.
The cool part is that the guy working the Adobe booth said the market will be flooded with Android tablets later in 2010, something that dovetails with what I’ve heard from analysts.
iPad and Android are expected to command 75 percent of the tablet market.