Feedback about the Flash Player download process.

Firstly, you always want the latest Flash Player. The only valid version of Flash Player is the current one.  It's backwards compatible (with some caveats), and more importantly, contains the most current and comprehensive set of security mitigations.  You should not browse the web while running an old copy of Flash Player.  It's just a bad idea.

That said, it's not exactly clear what the complaint here is, but I *think* it's about the bundled offers that come with Flash Player.

For better or worse, the bundled offers pay the bills.  I've posted extensive explanations which you can find in my activity history, but the bottom line is that while Flash Player is free, Adobe is a for-profit corporation.

While I'd love to live in a post-scarcity Start Trek style meritocracy, that day currently seems very remote.  In the meantime, we don't have the luxury of just spending money without generating income, and maintaining and distributing Flash Player is a tremendously complex and expensive undertaking.

At the end of the day, we pay business experts to research, identify and implement the most effective business strategy, and this is hands-down the approach that yields the best results.  It’s also the case that those bundled offers keep me employed, and it would be disingenuous to just blame it on the business people.

The truth is, a sufficient number of people find enough value in the bundled offers that they ultimately spend money with those sponsors, who in turn see value in partnering with us, which in turn keeps us supplied with engineers, servers, bandwidth and coffee.  It’s an imperfect solution for an imperfect world.  Those sponsors and their payloads are carefully vetted.

That said, you actually *do* have a few options at your disposal in terms of avoiding this prompt:

1.) Enable automatic updates. 

You do not get prompted for background updates.  We actually forego the revenue opportunity to ensure that you're always updated with the latest security patches.

2.) Use Google Chrome or Internet Explorer/Edge on Windows 8 and higher

These browser partners contribute directly to the Flash ecosystem in multiple ways, and distribute Flash Player as built-in components of their browsers.  There's nothing separate to download or install, and Flash Player is automatically kept updated via either the Chrome updater or Windows Update, respectively.

3.) Uninstall Flash Player

While probably not the optimal answer, you can always opt-out of participating in the ecosystem. 

I've included links to our uninstallers below, for your convenience:

Uninstall Flash Player - Mac:

https://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/uninstall-flash-player-mac-os.html

Uninstall Flash Player - Windows:

https://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/uninstall-flash-player-windows.html

Hope that helps!

This new flash player update better be very temporary. Anyone else dreading installing windows 8? I've been using 7 since it came out, and everything was going great until now. It is impossible to download the newest flash player on windows 7. I have used every browser on my computer and can't even get it to work so that I can do my classwork.

I had some new story not show a video because Flash Player wasn't working well.  So I went to Adobe to download latest version.  I started that download, and it stopped saying I must close Internet Explorer (which is the  browser I'm using to download the software.  I eventually got that out of the way, the Adobe finished loading, but then reported that it didn't register properly.

If Adobe wants me to upgrade, they need to make their installation process more rigorous than this.

I don't have time to be debugging Adobe's product installation software.

tq

yes im rather unhappy too. i watched for the spaces t click 'i dont want this', unchecked them all and now i have 2 programs i cannot uninstall. 1 i cant find now and the other constantly says its still updating.... this is dumb because i would rather not use flash player at all than have my pc filling with programs i dont want... if this link this kind gentleman dropped in doesnt work i will be doing without... my pc is not a trash can...

Hi, The Manual Flash Player Installers and procedures are in this Troubleshooting Guide and instructions:

http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/191/tn_19166.html  

Thanks,

eidnolb

Yes. while trying to update Flash in Firefox  I just was directed to do a manual install of a missing plugin with a weird name - an executable which was touted for XP, which my box does not have.

Obviously Adobe does not even have a safe, secure install program, let alone Flash in the wild.

Jobs was right!