General consensus about Flash websites?

[OneGrassRoot]

I see more and more people creating awesome websites that have Flash features (wix.com is enabling many non-programmer types to do so).

They are definitely more visually appealing (IMHO), but is it still a good rule of thumb to not go that direction if you expect visitors to your site to be doing so from libraries and other computers that may not be able to handle loading Flash quickly or very well?

Thanks. :hi:

[canetoad]

1. Can't stand them

And generally do not hang around long enough for them to load.

[OneGrassRoot]

2. Cool. That's what I wanted to know.

Even though I'm personally sucked in (although it REALLY depends on the type of site; if it's artsy-fartsy, I like it; business, not so much), I didn't know if it was a given that all sites were moving toward being Flash-based or not.

Thanks much. :hi:

[canetoad]

3. You might have already seen this

http://www.webpagesthatsuck.com/

Been around for years and some really funny insight into bad web pages. It's also a good primer on accessibility - how some sites automatically exclude viewers because of poor design.

I'm looking forward to seeing this site of yours when it's finished. Hope you'll post a linky.

[OneGrassRoot]

4. A visually-impaired friend has started to enlighten me...

about web accessibility issues. So I'm always torn between "cool!" versus practical and functional for as many people as possible, though admittedly get lost as improvements are made as to what is "practical and functional for as many people as possible."

I'm not a programmer...not at all. I can work with a template or platform fairly well, though.

I was thinking about redoing this site, since it's for a book and that Wow Factor Flash provides might be nice. This was created with typo3; a programmer friend loaded the template and I went from there.

Thanks again, and I'll check out that link. :hi:

[RoyGBiv]

5. Hate ...

Among the many reasons I hate flash-based websites is that they are not accessible to the visually impaired.

[OneGrassRoot]

6. Thank you. So there's definitely no new technology that's changed that.

I wasn't sure if there was some new technology that has made flash more accessible. I won't entertain flash-based websites any more.

Thanks!