Originally Posted by
rally
I guess my question is also if there is more than one maker of Flash, I assume "shockwave flash" is one maker , but is there another flash player ?
It is all proprietary.
Seriously, find and install the flash blocker add-on. It won't stop you from viewing the flash content you want to view, but it will (by default) block all the ads. You can whitelist sites you want enabled by default. I know that's not what you asked, but it's a reasonable way to deal with it.
Good luck.
-David