Comment 232 for bug 173890

Not sure if this is the right place for this comment, but in my opinion the real problem in this case was that Adobe mixed security fixes and "major changes" (which made Flash no longer working with existing software like Konqueror) into a single release.

This is something that can probably only be prevented either by Adobe offering stable versions for longer time, or by having an open-sourced alternative like Gnash that allows Ubuntu to maintain stable versions and manually backport security fixes.

Also, I think that trying to find a way to install old Flash versions is the wrong solution, because it would deliberatly install software with known security holes. During the last months, Ubuntu+Flash+Konqueror/Opera users were probably an easy target for an attacker: they were all vulnerable and had quite predictable software environment (read: most likely all users had the same Konqueror/Opera version and the same libraries installed). So I think the solution that was used here (to keep back the update) was quite dangerous, and should not be repeated in the future.

As for Adobes wishlist, maybe it would be more appropriate to ask for long-supported stable versions with stable interfaces?