hello, sorry i think it's not possible for firefox support to answer this question since we don't have any influence on the naming system or release cycle of flash - you'd have to put this question to adobe's support.

this site always lists the latest version of flash available: https://www.adobe.com/products/flashplayer/distribution3.html

I don't think you quite understand my question. Adobe did something to Flash that makes it not work with Firefox. To me, this means that Firefox needs to find out what Adobe did and determine how Firefox needs to change in order to use the new version of Flash. I don't think Adobe is going to change Firefox. Adobe should tell the Firefox developers what the changes were, why Firefox won't work, and what Firefox needs to do to make it work.

If Adobe is making changes to Flash that benefit Microsoft only, then that speaks of discrimination and Adobe needs to hear the community complain. Adobe has already stopped development of Flash for the Linux community. Unfortunately, I have found no viable substitute for Flash.

IE has its' own version of Flash (ActiveX) which always has different sub-version numbering than the Plugin versions of Flash that Firefox and other browsers use. IOW, Flash builds certain parts of Flash separately for each browser; that's nothing new, it has always been done in that manner.

Then there is a real problem here. How can a typical user who doesn't know any better that installs the IE version of Flash ever expect to be able to use Firefox? Most users automatically install any updates to Flash and are stuck unable to use Firefox. If Flash builds things separately for each browser, then how can Firefox, Opera, Chrome and IE be expected to use the same version of Flash? Something doesn't make sense.

Is there a viable alternative to Adobe's flash that is fully functional that can be installed and used?