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Answers to Flash
The Good
There are a number of great things about Flash, not the least of which is the fact that it allows you to make a website interactive. Easy interactivity is something that most people love on their websites because it allows people to interact with your website and feel like part of the experience, without being too difficult for most people to accomplish. This is one of the principle good things about using Flash on your website.
In addition to this however, there is also the idea of Flash allowing you to overcome browser compatibility problems. Many browsers will not take specific HTML code intended for other browsers and they also have custom applets that would never be recognized when you were dealing with another browser. Flash however is cross-platform and therefore you do not have to worry about a browser having problems playing Flash; the program is universal and the applet that accompanies the program is universal as well.
Finally, Flash serves to provide contrast within the content of your website. While words and pictures are very impressive and should form the basis of all website content, sometimes having a Flash program around for contrast is a good idea. This can increase the usefulness of the content by portraying it in a different way.
The Bad
Of course, when it comes to Flash, there are bad things as well. The main problem with Flash is that it is not something that is installed on computer browsers initially. Most of the browsers that you can download and use require you to actually download the flash player in order to make web Flash options a possibility and therefore this can be annoying for a user that is not computer savvy and wants to get to your content now.
In addition to that, the Flash player also has the ability to cause annoyance through wait times. Especially since most of the world is still not operating on broadband connections, loading things like Flash files is going to take a long time and for the most part it is time that people are going to get annoyed at having to wait. This, like the idea of having to download the Flash player before anything can be seen, can cause customer annoyance and that is ultimately not a good thing for your website.
Making Changes and Updates to the Flash on your website is not ideal if your content is frequently changing. Flash updates are much more time consuming that simple Text or Image updates.
Finally, Flash objects are not recognized by most search engines and therefore Flash players can really mess with the search engine optimization that your website might otherwise have down pat. So there are trade-offs involved using Flash on your website indiscriminately, but selective use in moderation in order to enhance already established content is always a good idea.
Richmond Hill
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