Annoying Flash

From: Mark Bodach <mbodach_at_bluelanterntech.com>
Date: Fri 29 Mar 2002 10:11:55 -0600

Its time for the death of Flash Splash pages... and in
general, death to Splash pages.

I personally find Flash one of the most annoying features
of a website. It is slow to load, people try to be too
fancy, and I have to wait. Just like if I walk into a
store and the salesperson does this fantastic dance,
jumping all around, to a funky beat, after second time
being at the store, I will do my best to avoid the
salesperson like the plague... Better still is if there
is a competing store next door that will provide the same
service, but no massive sales pitch each time, they will
get my business.

I believe that Flash does have a role to fill in a
website. It provides an excellent presentation environment,
and should be used only when the customer can avoid it.
What I would really like to see is a SKIP and SKIP
ALWAYS functionality added. Drop a cookie on my box, I
don't care, but don't make me watch your song and dance
every time I want something from you. If in real life a
salesperson did this every time you walked in the
front door, you would find it annoying. And sure the
SKIP button helps, but some Flash designers build it into
the Flash file, so going back to our salesperson example,
the salesperson would stand there blocking your way
until they are about ready to begin and then let you
past at any time.

If a company MUST you splash, and I will agree that there
are some industries that do benefit from it (music, movies,
and maybe clothing stores, the majority of sites do not).
I propose a couple of ways to stop annoying me on the web:

1) Think about the salesperson, then think about the
customer, then think again about using Flash.

2) The SKIP link should be outside of the Flash SWF file
so that I can get past without waiting.

3) The SKIP ALWAYS link would be a nice addition, then I
wouldn't need to return to the Flash SWF ever again,
unless I wanted to.

4) Think about the salesperson, then think about the
customer, then think again about using Flash.

5) For every screen component / element that a user must
enure loading, make sure there is value in the user waiting.

6) Must your site be entirely Flash.

Sites built entirely in Flash are:

1) Slower to load

2) Slow down the customer when browsing, because most
like a "cool" transition effect

3) More expensive to maintain. HTML sites are easier to
change. Also HTML programming is usually less then Flash
programming costs

4) More expensive to build. Usually a HTML version of the
site needs to be also built for those people too lazy to
download Flash.

5) Think about the salesperson, then think about the
customer, then think again about using Flash.

6) Usually pretty to look at, and if the wow factor is
what you want on EVERY PAGE OF YOUR SITE, then so be it.

[Note from Moderator: and let's not forget that flash
content is not indexed by the search engines, cannot be
internally bookmarked, and often cannot be cut and
pasted. --Cliff]

I do like Flash banners though, especially if I can play on
them...


Mark B
Blue Lantern Technologies
416.721.7149
www.BlueLanternTech.com
sales_at_BlueLanternTech.com

"Have a Dynamic Website? Need to Administrate it?"
www.bluelanterntech.com/wsm/






Received on Fri Mar 29 2002 - 10:11:55 CST