

Exploring Design: Outstanding Start Pages - dawie
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2007/07/17/exploring-design-outstanding-start-pages/

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adamdoupe
Ugh, these are horrible from a user interface standpoint. Sure they look great
(and are an interesting experiment) but how will the average person use them?
Does the use of these fancy flash pages create value for your website? Only if
it's a particularly creative website e.g. bands.

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knewjax
I love all the sites on this post. There is a diffrence between websites built
for art and websites built for commmerce. There is no reason these sites need
to be indexed well or valid CSS, they are not trying to monetize the user, or
get top placement in google. Most are just experiments in new ways to
visualize and display information. As flash and other methods become more
advanced we will be able to use more navigation techniques like these while
giving up less as far as SEO. New ideas like this help us rethink how people
interact with the internet and ultimatley lead to innovation. Art is about
breaking the rules. These sites are art.

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steve
Debate useless without actual numbers.

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knewjax
What kind of numbers would you be refering too?

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steve
Conversion rates, user loyalty, whatever is relevant to the purpose ultimate
purpose of the site.

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henryw
These Flash interfaces are awesome. Anyone here got any advice on starting to
learn Flash to design these kinds of interfaces?

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jamesbritt
First read stuff by Tufte and Tognazzini and Cooper first.

Learn Flash second

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knewjax
there someting in arcitecture called form vs.funtion.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Form_follows_function> I live by this in
interface design. First decide what funtion needs to happen, then decide on
the best visual representation or form to achieve this. Basically this means
the technology should not dictate what the interface or idea is. If you come
up with a great idea, then you can explore what technology you need to execute
it at the highest level, be it Flash, or another method.

