Due to Adobe’s AIR, a technology that lets web applications be run on the desktop on Linux, Mac, or Windows, it seemed like Adobe was headed in the direction of platform independence. Now, Adobe has made those plans official with their Open Screen Project.

I view the project, which is intended to bring Flash and Air to everything from TVs to PCs to handheld devices and UMPCs, as an official statement from Adobe (and a number of other prominent companies that are also involved) that they believe, as I do, that cross-platform internet-connected applications are the future. Because Adobe is seeing this so early, they will likely become a great supporter of Linux, even if they don’t try to.

As cross-platform applications start to take off, thanks to AIR and other similar projects, the barrier to adopting Linux is going to shrink and quickly disappear. At that point, I think we will begin to see more and more switchers to Linux and other smaller operating systems.

Because of this, Adobe is going to play an essential part in destroying a key barrier to the adoption of Linux.