Better Flash Indexing from Google

[CVW]

One for the designers...

Google have announced improvements to the indexing of Flash elements. Some details here

Erk! My best excuse for not bothering to learn Flash is being eroded.

[Toon]

That's really good news, I just hope we don't see a massive increase in people using Flash just because it can be indexed when it's not really needed

[PR Design]

Originally Posted by Toon

...I just hope we don't see a massive increase in people using Flash just because it can be indexed when it's not really needed

Amen.

[D856C]

While the notice may not cover all the improvements, it didn't mention a chief drawback to Flash and search.

Many sites are done as a singular, big, flash file. This all-in-one design is one of the things Flash designers see as an advantage. However, to the search engine, this Flash file reads as one page.

SEO often calls for individually optimized pages, each around different keywords. That you lose this ability with all-in-one Flash sites is, as yet, still a major problem. It seems a unclear if external resources called by the flash file would allow you to restore this functionality -- another common practice.

[mr350z2006]

I think it's great that google is taking a step in that direction but I'll still be shying away from this because of slow loading time for some flash applets.

[Diablos]

I think its good news too, I like that they are trying to actually react to peoples questions/expectations.

The best thing will be the ability to use a bit of flash in menus, make portfolio sites SEO friendly and fancy

[webarchitect]

Well I hope flash won't dominate the webspace now. Flash may have passed through the Search needle but still it's very heavy for websites to run, and for users to view.

[CVW]

Originally Posted by webarchitect

Well I hope flash won't dominate the webspace now. Flash may have passed through the Search needle but still it's very heavy for websites to run, and for users to view.

The trouble with Flash, for me, is that designers don't have to follow "convention" when creating layout, links and other navigation. This makes many flash only sites unusable without instructions from the designer- even for a tech savvy visitor.

For instance, how am I supposed to know that more content will appear if I hover those 10 pixels. Or that that strange shape is actually a really important link.

Not really much to do with search engines but if Google suggests a site to me, I am annoyed if it's below par. And being able to actually use it is important.

[Diablos]

Yeah CVW I totoally agree with you, using flash to spice a page up is one thing, using it to break conventions and make the web difficult to navigate is another.

Google claims user experience is the number one influence on SERPs so we shouldn't see any of that kind of shit ranking but you know that theroy and practice are a little different.

[CVW]

As mentioned in this thread, Flash has some inherent problems when it come to SEO - even if it can be seen by Google.

So, for all excited flash developers SEOMoz has a good article on the issues here