SAUSALITODOG, h264 is a video standard and isn't capable of interactive response like the flash-based charts. h264 isn't a flash substitute.
There is canvas + javascript, but that doesn't work for IE users on windows XP, which represents > 30% of the market, as compared to iPad users who are a tiny fraction of that.
svg could possibly be used for rendering the charts, but that too has a very uneven record of support in browsers. The old ride player used svg, but it required a plugin to work under IE, and didn't work at all for firefox, so they rewrote it in flash.
Asking Garmin to support two schemes, one for iPad and one for everything else, will likely go nowhere.
My point not that Adobe lost, conversely nor did Apple "win": the rules were changed from under Adobe for idealogical dogmatic reasons - there was no "fight" to win or lose.
Looks more like "I don't want to play with you any more so I'm taking my ball home" to me (as much as I despise Flash as a content renderer).
The only losers here are those that use the iPad/iPhone/iPod - because they're being denied the content for one man's ego.
