flash media advantages

With the rising popularity of flash type journalism, I think that it is an exciting time for convergence journalists. While flash media comes with a few downfalls to audiences such as accessability or blurred text, I believe the benefits much outweigh the downfalls.
I think that flash gives a great education aspect to journalism that may have not been as possible before. It is a well known fact that some people are more visual learners, such things such as graphics and animations may serve well for them. They old saying a picture is worth a thousands words may hold true for such things, especially when they are used in addition to a text story. I think that readers are becoming less inclined to pay attention for longer periods of time (especially younger readers) and flash may be a way to get information to people in a shorter amount of time. Because some flash elements are "interactive", they may also have the ability to hold the attention of people longer. Attractive, informative flash elements may catch the attention of readers to some stories, especially about topics they may not usually pay attention to.
What confused me about the reading was the section on the definition of "interactivity." I always thought that if there was some kind of element that allowed used to manipulate the given information in some way, it was considered interactive. But I found that this is not necessarily true.