SVG is Scalable Vector Graphics — think Macromedia Flash, but standards-based. Today the W3C approved SVG 1.1 along with two “Mobile SVG” profiles — SVG Basic and SVG Tiny — as official recommendations. SVG Basic is intended for devices like handhelds/PDAs, and SVG Tiny is intended “highly restricted” devices like mobile phones.

Macromedia, through strategy, a good authoring tool and player, and — let’s face it — luck, has a defacto monopoly on web vector graphics with Flash. This is a problem, because (1) Flash is proprietary and because (2) Macromedia is basically a one-trick pony at this point, ripe for acquisition. (Rumors persist that Microsoft will be buying them.)

So far, it appears that mobile phone makers don’t trust Macromedia with their vector graphics any more than they trust Microsoft with their OS. Look for SVG to gain a beachhead in the mobile device market first.

Shame on Adobe for not open-sourcing their SVG viewer, and not understanding their business imperative to do so. If SVG was everywhere, Adobe wouldn’t be getting the crap beat out of them by Macromedia in the vector-media-for-the-web authoring space. | News.com story | W3C PR | Adobe SVG Viewer 3