Flash is evil

Readers may remember several posts on the subject of Macromedia Flash’s resistible rise.

While my personal design philosophy remains the same it has always been (as regards plug-ins) that the good ones are great and if used appropriately, are welcome.

For a funny and much less level headed assessment of the destruction of the internet by the legions of vile Flash-wielding wankers, read dack.com

I’ve lifted this little pearl…

Maybe you have never seen e-commerce sites in flash, forms, chat rooms, but I can tell you they not only exist, but are in most cases superior, as they require less back end work from the server, thus making them more reliable

So less server involvement makes sites more reliable. I’m sorry, this isn’t even funny…

(update 17 May 2026 - Crickey I really had a lot of free time to get grumpy about Flash!)

• Flash is evil (2002-05-14) — on “Macromedia Flash’s resistible rise”. _posts/2002/2002-05-14-flash-is-evil.md
• One of the reasons I got over my futuresplash obsession (2002-02-06) — following Flash from its FutureSplash infancy. _posts/2002/2002-02-06-one-of-the-reasons-i-got-over-my-futuresplash-obsession.md
• Flash (2002-07-22) — a whole-site .swf with no linkable pages. _posts/2002/2002-07-22-flash.md
• Flash and dhtml select lists (2002-08-02) — Flash-like effects “without the plugin”. _posts/2002/2002-08-02-flash-and-dhtml-select-lists.md
• Flash battering (2003-03-10) — a Flash site that hides the information you want. _posts/2003/2003-03-10-flash-battering.md
• White labelling with CSS (2004-08-24) — a 200 MB FutureSplash .swf problem. _posts/2004/2004-08-24-white-labelling-with-css.md
• CSS for Flash sites (2004-09-08) — an all-FutureSplash site demanding the latest plugin. _posts/2004/2004-09-08-css-for-flash-sites.md
• Old chestnuts roasting on the open fire (2004-12-21) — Flash movies as “islands of content” vs the Semantic Web. _posts/2004/2004-12-21-old-chestnuts-roasting-on-the-open-fire.md
• links for 2007-09-17 (2007-09-17) — the Flash plugin’s versioning and “it’s still a plugin” problems. _posts/2005 to 2008/2007-09-17-links-for-2007-09-17.md
• Hello Cufón goodbye sIFR (2009-04-12) — moving off the Flash-based sIFR type technique. _posts/2009 to 2010/2009-04-12-hello-cufon-goodbye-sifr.md
• How to lose customers with Flash and Flex (2009-10-25) — Flash/Flex as a customer-experience liability. _posts/2009 to 2010/2009-10-25-how-to-lose-customers-with-flash-and-flex.md
• Raging Cow (2003-03-27) — a jab at “pointless flash animations” in marketing. _posts/2003/2003-03-27-raging-cow.md
• eat.co.uk get it right (2008-06-27) — broken links caused by loading the site’s Flash movie. _posts/2005 to 2008/2008-06-27-eatcouk-get-it-right.md

Darn;-)