Comments on: The New York Times Without Flash

By: Stuart

Stuart — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 01:06:23 +0000

Q1 2011 – iOS is currently being outsold by Android and even Symbian… this year, smart phones and tablets in competition to Apple will support Flash.

By: Bernard Farrell

Bernard Farrell — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 21:17:47 +0000

These infographics are extremely useful, truly making complex data easy to understand. The argument about using HTML5 are disingenuous, that technology won’t be widely available (where most NYT readers have browsers supporting HTML5) until at least 2012 (imho).

I do think NYT has a superb team I just wish they taught an infographics class, I’d sign up immediately.

By: Lloyd

Lloyd — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 05:58:50 +0000

Clicking on each of the graphics gets me a larger cached graphic – fine, given the NYT might remove or move its content, but hardly interactive. But the ‘How Different Groups Spend Their Day’ text link goes to the parking ticket infographic. Link should be to:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2009/07/31/business/20080801-metrics-graphic.html?src=tp

This could be done with javascript rollovers to swap graphs and imagemaps and rollovers for clicking on the graphs to isolate categories. It doesn’t need flash.

By: Scott Flodin

Scott Flodin — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 16:56:41 +0000

This great NY Times interactive graphic doesn’t use Flash, only Javascript: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/05/01/us/20100501-oil-spill-tracker.html

Note that even the text on the map (city names, etc) is in HTML, not part of the images.

By: PR

PR — Mon, 10 May 2010 15:05:59 +0000

Doug – thanks for this… I’ve been posting those same links in conversations around the web every time somebody says “HTML5 can replace Flash”. Now I can just point to this post!

And for what it’s worth, I can say, in no uncertain terms, that much of what the NYTimes is doing in Flash is currently IMPOSSIBLE in HTML5/Javascript so it drives me nuts when people claim otherwise. I do datavis work, and spent 3 weeks trying to duplicate a visualization in HTML5/JS and it is wonky at best. Further, upon trying it on the iPad, the javascript engine couldn’t keep up and the experience sucked. This same application would take me about 3 days in Flex.

Further, I don’t care if it *can* be done in HTML5/JS, those technologies are the wrong tool for the job (anybody who tries to build-out serious animations/interactions has found all the same issues I did). Flash is currently the right tool for the job. By forcing developers to use the wrong tool, creativity gets stifled.

Go figure, Apple stifling creativity. (I mean that seriously, I didn’t see that coming)

By: Robert

Robert — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 13:41:49 +0000

@joe,

I love comments like these. The debate between HTML 5 and flash has always been a chicken and egg scenario. HTML 5 was defined by the things HTML 4 can’t currently do, but are available in plugin form right now. If HTML 5 makes flash obsolete, progress will slow down to a crawl because everything will be dictated by a standards body that doesn’t do much more than argue. They need a technology to copy from so they know what users and developers want. I imagine that it has been and will continue to be Adobe innovating and everyone else trying to play catch-up. I’m not a fanboy – if another technology made sense to use, I’d use it in a heartbeat. I want to do cool stuff today, though.

By: nuthinking blog - Christian Giordano » Blog Archive » Something you should consider before buying an iPad

Thu, 01 Apr 2010 21:27:24 +0000

[...] Do Apple really think that most of people these days don’t need Flash when browsing the web? I’m sure there are many others which regularly see websites with Flash content, like the one showed during the presentation, which are not the popular large Web 2.0 sites (YouTube, Vimeo), many small and personal sites can host videos these days, or maybe the future is Facebook pages not websites, maybe… but the reality that not even Google, which is a big promoter of web standards, thinks of ridding of the Flash Player, in facts they just announced the plugin will be embedded, and better integrated, in their browser. On a personal level, the lack of Flash Player in the iPhone is the reason why I don’t use Twitter on it, too many links points to sites with Flash content and not only videos! [...]

By: Pura Kieck

Pura Kieck — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 12:29:50 +0000

I’m sure I’m not in the minority by any means, but I do intend to improve. I suppose my main problem is that I find large numbers of comments overwhelming, I can honestly say that I’ve skipped reading entries at friends’ blogs, just because there’s already ninety comments on it, and I a) don’t want to get lost in the shuffle, or worse b) don’t want to be obligated to spew out forty comments of my own.

By: Todd

Todd — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 17:29:26 +0000

Hey, does anyone know of some tutorials, information for creating some of those NYTimes style Flash maps? you know the ones where you can mouse over the county lines and they have focus, etc… I assume it’s something done dynamically, but maybe I’m wrong and somone actually laysout all those vector details.

Thanks.

By: _mark

_mark — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 22:36:54 +0000

thx for this. adding it to my collection of useful flash data visualizations.

Anyone, PLEASE FEEL FREE TO PROVIDE ANY LINKS to other great data vis using flash.
Im trying to collect them.

Here’s one I frequently visit (I’m sure most have seen it, but it’s still a great one)
DIGG LABS ARC: http://labs.digg.com/arc/