[Mr Fred]

listen to andy. he knows.

Actually Andy I will pm concerning some freelance stuff soon. v soon. Also gray if you still interested give me a pm.

[gray]

dont get me wrong, i love flash, its my favorite program to work in, and allows most creative freedom.. i would love to see the back of other web technologies which are so much hassle but i cant yet.. still convincing clients to use flash

pm'ing now mate

[andycogbill]

It's not that I *know*, it's what I feel. I watch Flash jump from 4 to 5 to MX and the improvements are just astounding. Think of what Macromedia can accomplish in another couple of years.

That said, the search engine problem is a big one. How does a web designer get around it? I'd be interested to know how you guys hack it for the time being, before search engines "learn" flash.

[gray]

there is a search engine that can read swfs, but i forgot the name of it..

best way round it is to have urls with 'fake' pages full of keywords which forward a user to the real address using javascript.. *cough*

[andycogbill]

Originally Posted by gray

there is a search engine that can read swfs, but i forgot the name of it..

best way round it is to have urls with 'fake' pages full of keywords which forward a user to the real address using javascript.. *cough*

is that what is called milfing? what if the user has JS turned off?

[gray]

there are other methods of auto forwarding

[andycogbill]

Originally Posted by gray

there are other methods of auto forwarding

such as...? like a PHP header change at the top of a page full of applicable words and such? no, i don't think that would even work... because the web crawler would just get forwarded automatically. so, how?

[Stickman]

What a load of shit this thread is.

Pie in the sky for flash designers.

[Mr Fred]

up yours stick

[Stickman]

Haha - good point, well made.

[Stickman]

I'm glad you people are here really. If I ever need a 250kb intro and a spinning logo, I'll know who to ask.

[sleepingfish]

And if anyone ever gets the urge to make a blog site, we all know who to go to

[Stickman]

I'd do it with xml and import it into flash if I was you.

[sleepingfish]

Originally Posted by Stickman

I'd do it with xml and import it into flash if I was you.

But make sure you set the quality to at least 30% when exporting it as a GIF

[andycogbill]

I used to be heavily against the use of Flash in any sort of environment. Learning Flash has changed all of that for me - I can make some pretty cool stuff in a filesize comparable to a .gif logo.

To continue this argument, I just want to say that I really feel as though the web is getting more and more about an "experience" rather than a place to get hard information; especially in terms of branding businesses, corporations, etc. True, Flash can be used in the wrong places, but all I'm saying is that what is true right now won't be in a few years.

Y'all can't seriously think that XHTML will hold first place when people like my grandma are getting DSL.

[Stickman]

Why use flash for everything?

Because you can, because it's getting better, because you like working in it etc. It's got nothing to do with the end user and the delivery of information.

The back button doesn't even work ffs - and I know that you can script it to work but you flashers don't, do you? Hmmm?

Flash has it's place (vectors, multimedia, streaming, blah blah etc) and it does that well, but it's not going to take over the internet. And who says that when grandmas have DSL something else won't have come along and trumped flash? Technology evolves - that's why we use xhtml and not html, Flash MX not Flash 4 still.

[Brown]

Originally Posted by Stickman

The back button doesn't even work ffs - and I know that you can script it to work but you flashers don't, do you? Hmmm?

another fine point well made.