Today Adobe fixed my main problem related to browsing the web using Linux: they’ve released a working version (9) of the Flash player plugin capable of playing flash 8 files for Linux. Release notes of the player can be found here the player itself can be downloaded here.
After installation Firefox prints the following info for the plugin:
Shockwave Flash
File name: libflashplayer.so
Shockwave Flash 9.0 d55
Works like a charm, kudos to Adobe (well… not for the inhumane timeframe… but still).