Just recently, I was using the web to look up some information about a new mobile device, when I innocently clicked a link to a following page and was startled (as was everyone nearby in the office) by loud, blaring music that suddenly started to issue from my computer. Arrggh! The curse of Adobe Flash had struck again!
I have come to regard Flash as the absolute bane of the internet. The technology’s chief purpose seems to be to annoy the hell out of anyone surfing the web. Is there actually a bona fide purpose for Flash, other than creating endless animated adverts to ambush the unwary? If there is, I think we should be told about it.
The reason I became subjected to the unwelcome assault on my eardrums in the first place was because I was seeking out information for an article on mobile devices, and a certain global maker of phone handsets has decided, in its wisdom, to make its web site accessible only to those with a Flash plug-in for their browser.
Until recently, I had resolutely refused to download Flash in an attempt to avoid the teeth-grindingly infuriating adverts that jump out at you from web pages. Disappointingly, my boycott became untenable because more and more organisations seem to find it impossible to create a web presence without employing Flash-based content.
This isn’t just an idle gripe of mine, it also has an effect on accessibility. A growing number of mobile devices have a screen that is just large enough to make web browsing tolerable, but how many of these have a built-in Flash player, even if one exists for the platform? And why should users have to download an extra application, simply to look at a web page? Over-reliance on Flash means that users of such devices are likely to be greeted with a screen bearing only the message “Flash player not detected”.
I also think it demonstrates bad web design to make your entire web site into one massive Flash application, in the same league as sites in the past that only worked with Internet Explorer. By all means make some content Flash-based, but you should not need anything beyond a browser to navigate around a site.
A friend of mine once showed me a prime example: a charity had a front page where a number of coloured blobs swooshed in from the side, before forming into a rotating circle, after which text labels appeared identifying which blob to click on to take you to different areas of the site. Without Flash player the site was completely inaccessible – a ludicrous situation for a page intended to disseminate information.
It’s probably too late to exile Flash to the lowest circle of technology hell, where it so rightly belongs, but users ought at least to be given greater control over whether animations, video and audio can play. At the moment, control is all in the hands of the fiends that create the content. How about an off switch, Adobe?
