Flash or HTML

If you're talking about being more marketable in a downsized job market, definitely.

If you mean that you'd like to use Flash exclusively instead of HTML for interfaces, then that depends on what kind of webpages you are producing.

If you're asking my opinion, then I'd recommend trying to be competent in a bunch of multimedia apps (Flash, Director, etc.), and a master at HTML

Mike

I *suppose* flash has it's place. But not on commercial sites, not without a non-flash alternative.

Flash is NOT accessible to a lot of people, whether because of a disability, old hardware/software, or because they surf with different devices (PDA, Cell phones, etc).

If you have a commercial site where you want to sell a product, it is generally a bad idea to block content from your visitors.

YMMV

It's definetly worth learning though and I think in the future you will find that most browsers will be compatible "out of the box". Anyway it's lots of fun to play with! A good program to start with is Swish - this makes flash very easy.

Kindest regards
Lobos

That's exactly right. I knew nothing about Flash - though a friend of mine had given me MX. Totally intimidated, I downloaded Swish 2.0 trial version. After a few days messing around with that I was confident enough to open up MX and dig in. I eventually bought a book by the Friends of Ed people and the rest is history (at least in my mind). More skills is ALWAYS better. And it doesn't sound like you're in danger of losing your HTML skills. You need them both to make hot Flash sites anyway... Just because you use one doesn't mean you automatically lose the other. http://www.ultrashock.com is the most awesome forum for Flash. Check it out.

Never hurts to learn something new! Besides, once you start getting into Flash, you'll have a better idea of what you could do with it personally, and to what degree you want to master it.