Download Squad originally told you about the Adobe Flash beta in May, and yesterday Adobe announced further updates to "Astro." So what do you have to look forward to?

From a viewer's standpoint, there are several new features of interest. Tops among them: advanced 3d effects - that's right, Flash now supports shaders. Web gamers rejoice, because this no doubt means a whole new era of addictive browser-based gaming.

Sound APIs have been refined as well, which should provide a boost not only for games, but also for streaming media applications. Also along these lines, Flash 10 support dynamic bitrate adjustments. Translation: it'll adapt to crappy network conditions automatically so that your video doesn't get all choppy.

Adobe has just made the prerelease version of Flash Player 10 available for download. Almost as impressive as the player itself is the fact that the beta is available for Windows, OS X AND Linux (including Ubuntu support)!

For the full list of features and known issues, check out the release notes, but some of the highlights are:

• New text engine
• Ubuntu OS support
• Custom filters and effects
• Large bitmap support

Adobe's demo page for Flash Player 10 is pretty impressive; we especially liked the inverse kinematic and native 3D demos.

Adobe recommends uninstalling previous versions of Flash Player before installing 10 beta. Downloads are available here.

Thanks Evan!

At long last, Adobe has released the final version of Flash Player 9 for Linux. The first beta version was released back in October, and today is the first time in a long time the Linux player has been caught up to the Windows version. The version released is x86 only, and there's no word on whether a 64-bit version is on its way. Rumor over at Slashdot is that Adobe's Penguin.SWF blog is rejecting negative comments, which sits poorly with me. If Adobe is really embracing Flash on Linux--as would seem to be indicated by the very existence of its Flash-on-Linux blog--they should be addressing the community's concerns directly, not burying them.

Nevertheless, I'm sure some Linux users are thrilled to have an up-to-date Flash player in their browser, if nothing else for watching YouTube. Linux users, please share your experiences with the new plugin in the comments. You can download the Flash Player 9 for Linux on Adobe's download page.

At long last, Linux users can finally get a version of Flash Player 9 that runs natively in their OS. Yesterday Adobe released a beta version of Flash Player 9 for Linux. Linux users have been waiting a very long time indeed for this release, having suffered with Flash Player 7 for years while Windows and Mac users got to play with Flash Player 8 and then 9.

So, have any of our Linux brethren tried this new Flash for Linux yet? Is it all it's cracked up to be, or a day year late and a dollar short?

[Via Slashdot]

Google has started dropping some tests of their streaming video ads and video content from the recent deal with Viacom's MTV Networks.

The deal sees MTV Networks providing content for the ads that will run in place of Google's AdWords on websites. Through the ads, Viacom can showcase clips of such premium programs as SpongeBob SquarePants, Laguna Beach, The Real OC, and the MTV Video Awards.

There were a handful of publishers that were chosen to be included into the beta test of the program, and one of them has provided a link to where their test is occurring. The document that was provided to publishers explained that Google's Streaming Video Content and Ads enable website publishers to display streaming video ads and video content from MTV Networks on their sites. Publishers were instructed that they will get the specific JavaScript that will embed a Flash player into their website. The ad will still be served off of Google's servers and viewers of the ad must have the Macromedia Flash plug-in installed in order to view the streaming content.

Revenue for these ads is generated on a CPM basis depending on the number of views on each ad in the content. So if someone watches the whole video and sees five ads, the publisher will be paid for those five views. If no ad is seen by the user, there will be no payment for the ad. Revenue from the ad will be split between the content provider, Google and the publisher.

[via Google System]