Truth is Adobe get no additional revenue from development of a 64bit version of their Flash Player, but if they put their heads behind forcing people to buy ever-greater builds of Acrobat Professional they do make revenue.
I believe it's really that simple...
Thats becoming less and less true with the release of 64bit systems with IE8 64bit being standard.
True we can all use 64bit browsers but there is in fact a difference in speed when using the 64bit browsers verses the 32bit when comparing similar browsers.
The scream is getting louder and louder and they risk losing their format. People would rather have speed 99% of the time rather than have to use two browsers just for the 1% of the time they need flash.
16bit stuff is a thing of the past and 32bit is not too far behind.
But I think your right in the respect that when dealing with open source browsers, there is little monetary return for them to support them in the name of being free.
Whats wrong with they psychology is one says, "they need to pay for our services as we don't do this for free", the other operates like Google and says "the customers get it for free so we become a standard in every home and every workplace and the money will come from ads and subscribers to flash content".
They just need to think a little bigger out of the box.
There is a lot of competition for the desktop out there and all of them would like their palms greased.... only the ones who came some way "become the standard" will flush out the others.
Flash will not become the standard holding back on an opportunity thats only going to go up and grow.
64bit is going no where, except to 128bit!
Sounds like too much old blood at the top if they can't think a little bigger than 32 bit!
Competition will prevail.. if they can't meet the need, someone else will.