What is Digg?28 Comments
- drlha, on 10/14/2008, -1/+23Just what the web needs: More Flash. (sarcasm of course)
- scoot2006, on 10/14/2008, -1/+8Dear Interwebs,
No one wants a flash intro on a web site.
Thanks,
Population of Earth. - decx, on 10/14/2008, -0/+4maybe they rename it for the german market
-> jerkoff - mcpotato, on 10/14/2008, -2/+6This tool will not be that successful for German speaking people. They don't want to be called wixers :-) ROTFLMAO.
- legendxx, on 10/14/2008, -0/+4That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard.
"I'm going to be a non-conformist by conforming with all the other non-conformists"
When people visit a website, 95% of the time they have a goal in mind. They want to get to that goal more than they want to be impressed by the visuals. CSS/HTML/Plain-Text achieves this flawlessly if executed properly. Flash is heavy, cumbersome, and usually comes with all kinds of bells, whistles, and useless tweens, that just make the user wait for their content. It's a hassle. - scoot2006, on 10/14/2008, -0/+3Yes, I do. So do 71% of other people (see the bailout stats)
http://www.websiteoptimization.com/speed/tweak/spl ...
Throwing useless (skippable = useless) information at my face when I initially want to visit a site is annoying enough, but with a return visit it gets even worse. There's another place to go for almost any content on the internet and I don't want to, nor should I have to, deal with force-fed ***** to get to it. - mungk, on 10/14/2008, -1/+4Wix? http://wix.sourceforge.net/index.html
Leela: We haven't thought of a name yet.
Bender: They're tasty, right? Let's call them tasticles.
Leela: We can't call them that.
Bender: Why not?
Leela: It sounds too much like those frozen rocky mountain oysters on a stick. You know, testsicles.
Hermes: According to government records the only names not yet trademarked are Popplers and Zitsels.
Fry: I know -- we'll call them Popplers. - dshPls, on 10/14/2008, -1/+4I disagree with the notion that full-flash sites are bad, because I truly think they aren't. My example is an example of horrible usage of a good platform.
I wouldn't approach the web experience the same way as you.. In my view, if you want a plain site go with an xhtml/ccs/php site, you can easily display your information and make it easy to use. But when someone wants an online experience, a memorable site, Flash is the best answer. The company I work for was behind Marilyn Manson's newest site (not the flashing intro thing in the beginning) but this: http://marilynmanson.com/index2.html
You can't expect to ever accomplish anything like that with a static platform. Whether you like the design or animation isn't in question here, it's the ability to display that design and animate it. It's very hard, if not impossible to give the user a web experience in anything besides Flash or Silvelight(which I'm inclined to dislike because it's a competitor.) - imasuperDOTcom, on 10/14/2008, -1/+3Flash Players: Pure Privacy Evil
http://www.imasuper.com/66/technology/flash-cookie ... - erik333, on 10/13/2008, -4/+6and all the new amazing features are on the way - cant wait!
- arjie, on 10/14/2008, -0/+2Maybe you have some sort of designer bias, everyone thinks that the stuff they're using is the best (think lisp programmers, c++ programmers, ruby programmers).
Now me, I'm a user, and I love when a site is pretty and usable. Flash has its place, but if someone were making a website and told me they were going to make it all in Flash, I'd ask them to please also make a non-flash version. And I'm not someone particularly whack, it's just that I like browsing some places on my phone while on the way to work, or sitting around not looking at a loading...70% screen when I'm in a hurry.
Then again, you're doing all the fun stuff, you want to restrict yourself to a certain set of users, go right ahead. Me, I'd just hate it if say, digg were to be all Flash. I've found quite a few sites very useful, and quite a few loads of fun, and they weren't in Flash. - drlha, on 10/14/2008, -0/+1Agreed, Flash has its place, mainly as a (mostly) platform independent video player IMHO. That website example you give above is the everything that is wrong about Flash, an entire webpage using Flash. All of that could have been done using XHTML/CSS/Javascript. We need to rail against all websites that are just one big Flash application and get things done right.
- dshPls, on 10/14/2008, -0/+1Yes I know this article will incite the hordes of Flash haters on Digg, and rightfully so. This is horrible. When you select dynamic text it scrolls and disappears, they didn't disable the rightclick menu.. and don't get me started on the actual sites.
But Flash has a place online. No one likes intro's, for sure, but that's because some idiot made one, not because Flash has a "make intro" button. This site is another example of horrible designers getting a hold of cool technology.
This site looks like a ***** falcon-punched bloody fetus turd: http://www.wix.com/Cadensmommy/11?gu_id=1d1c328a-d ...
But click some ***** and then use you back button, see how it works? Again, cool technology, horrible implementation. I just get mad because only the horrendous Flash is ever commented on, the great stuff out there is often overlooked. - unclemantis, on 10/14/2008, -1/+2Enough with the flash! When I go to a website I want to get in, get my info and get out. There should be a ban for Flash ads!
- mourne, on 10/14/2008, -0/+1Does any one know if you can upload your own images and such into this site?
On first glance.. it looks pretty slick - wfbnadador, on 10/14/2008, -0/+1garbage. although its catching up to flash sites made a decade ago.
- legendxx, on 10/14/2008, -0/+1I actually don't do any css/html at all. But I'm not an idiot and know that ALL usability experts with any shed of credibility would agree with me that Flash is the anti-christ of usable websites. Where did you get that statistic about flash? I know you didn't get it off the Adobe site.. they wouldn't have any bias at all. Did they use javascript to get it? Must have cause there is no other way to access that kind of information. God knows what the real number is.
Flash games are totally outside the realm of this article. You struck on the one thing that flash does well.. games. I guess that's your hail-mary whenever anyone attacks flash. Games have absolutely nothing to do with what makes a website usable. You could play the game on your desktop without having a web-page wrapped around it. You started this discussion saying that Flash was usable.. and ended with 'but flash games are cool!' Think about that. - legendxx, on 10/14/2008, -0/+1Did I miss something?
1) Where did I mention my 'web-savvy' friends?
2) The people offering contracts for work are the same ones sending work to India and/or believing every fad they hear about while passing by a starbucks. Just because it's where the work is doesn't mean it's useful or holds any merit at all.
3) So you're the one making annoying web advertisement banners? ***** you.
4) I guess this point went way over your head.. but I was talking in the context of websites or something that people come to with a goal in mind. Not an annoying 'banner' that acts only to annoy the ***** out of people to get their attention.
5) Flash works everywhere? Except the 23ish% of people who still use IE6.. given that I wouldn't put it past a similar percentage to not have flash installed on their machine. Cross-platform? How about the iphone? Every new-age device/gadget that can surf the web will first render html/css.. then hope to god adobe will port a flash player for them.
6) And all the 'information' based web work is where 99.9999% of the web goes every day. An individual will watch your animation once, say 'That was kinda neat' then never look at it again. While my customer will come back everyday because I offer something easy to understand and access. - Benno, on 10/14/2008, -0/+1Flash is good for complicated information graphics (newyorktimes), small games, and video (youtube, hulu, weeblesstuff). When it's used for site navigation, text display, shopping carts, or other primarily text-based components it's probably getting in the way and annoying end-users. I do a lot of javascript development so I'm no stranger to potentially annoying crap. I ask myself questions like "will this effect improve the user's experience or is it just something that looks cool the first 5 times you see it"? If it's the latter I don't use it. Unfortunately it seems the majority of flash designers don't ask those kind of questions.
- SSUK, on 10/14/2008, -3/+3Because finding that "skip" link must be so time consuming and tedious for you...
- manniman, on 02/01/2009, -0/+0Of course wix is a quite funny name - but it's a nice app :) dont be too hard cause of the name ;) it's even practicall for professionel web designers and seos like me http://www.svens-seo-consulting.de
- legendxx, on 10/14/2008, -2/+2Flash is a sign that you're trying way too hard.
- dshPls, on 10/14/2008, -1/+1@arjie
Yes it's true. I got into Flash because I thought it was the best platform for creative web development, there's no denying that. So yeah, like everyone I'd extremely biased. But I also call out bad Flash(like this *****) and wrongful usage of it. I wouldn't browse a Flash version of Digg either, as much fun as I have with the Digg Labs stuff... But Digg is way different from what I work on. I'm easily turned off by dull and boring websites that could be done so much better in Flash.
Here's an example. We're about to (hopefully) do work for the JHU Applied Physics Lab. They're working on prosthetic arms that are controlled by very small sensors implanted into patients. These sensors read signals from nerves sent from the brain, they send that info to a decoder which recognizes patterns and causes the arm to act accordingly. A man without an arm can think about grabbing an apple, and the arm will do it. Now their site has a simple graphic showing an artists rendering of this. Wouldn't it be so much cooler to use a flash video to show a 3D model of the arm working? Or a flash animation to show the brain sending info, sensors reading that, then sending it to a computer?
My long-winded point is Flash has many uses, some of which are even for informational purposes. It's multimedia friendly in a way that surpasses all other web technologies. We can further it's potential, instead of bastardize it for some bad designers usage of its tools.
@Legendxx
You're a CSS troll and I'll take 2 minutes to reply and that's it. By "your friends" I meant other people who code CSS like its baby jesus and swear by web standards. The people offering work are the ones who matter, much more than you do. Your opinion is appreciated but I don't really care because you're not paying me anything. I don't make "shoot the terrorist and win a iPod!" banners, but we do make a decent amount of web banners for a certain hotel brand. They're non intrusive and don't cause epileptics to sieze out..
98% of users have Flash installed, and I honestly don't care if grandma on her 486 can't view Flash. The iPhone is an issue though, I totally agree with that.
"An individual will watch your animation once, say 'That was kinda neat' then never look at it again. "
Worst line ever. We're behind a website of kids games that haven't got any advertising, yet receive 100k hits a month just from people passing links along. Yes the site has been on BBC and a couple of other mainstream sources but it's been the same thing since 2004. Kids play the games more than once, no doubt, and I've seen the webstat page many times. - minthu, on 10/19/2008, -0/+0Wix is really a creative web app for Flash. :)
- dshPls, on 10/14/2008, -1/+1And that's your tainted perspective of the web dude. No one cares what your web-savvy friends think, they're not offering contracts for work. I can assure you there's a huge market coming from musicians, film makers, artists and even more traditional businesses for Flash. Plus Flash is vector based, often times significantly reducing the file size when compared to bitmaps. I'm always compressing the ***** out of GIF web banners to fit within file size restrictions, when my flash files are always fine and look 100% better.
Not to mention it'll look the same cross-platform, in any browser... as our CSS guy who sits next to me is always bitching about having to do 3-4 work-arounds to get a ***** box to display in a certain position and do a certain thing on our static sites.
Enjoy doing all the "information" based web work, all the fun stuff is sent to us interactive designers. - dshPls, on 10/14/2008, -2/+1And a plain CSS site that's 100% standards compliant is a sign that you're no different than anyone else.
- huntermcwhite, on 10/14/2008, -1/+0just what we needed, frontpage for flash.
myspace is going to get a whole lot more annoying - inactive, on 10/14/2008, -6/+1Artful Widgets? That´s incredible! But SEO must be there too!
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