Comments on: Announcing the Flex SEO Contest

By: Joel Fiser

Joel Fiser — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 04:46:43 +0000

I will now use a cheap trick in an attempt to increase the incoming link count to my Flexmagically Searchable page:

Here’s the link:

By: Joel Fiser

Joel Fiser — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 04:42:19 +0000

Looks like I’m in the lead (sympleton.com). The results above me are HTML pages referencing the term Flexmagically Searchable.

Took aprox. 37 seconds to enter – due to the power of InfiniTree (my Flash-based CMS).

Flashers – this stuff is very important. We must dispel the SEO myths regarding Flash. BACK / FWD button functionality too.

However, I tend to agree with Theo that Google is really missing the point with all this jive about searching inside SWFs. Professional Flashers load their content dynamically. That way, to change the content, one doesn’t have to re-compile.

By: Ben

Ben — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 16:06:51 +0000

Also from the above link:

“At this time, content loaded dynamically from resource files is not indexed. We’ve noted this feature request from several webmasters — look for this in a near future update.”

By: Ben

Ben — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 16:05:17 +0000

According to Google external content is not linked with the swf file. Is there something I do not understand here?
http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2008/06/improved-flash-indexing.html

“2. We currently do not attach content from external resources that are loaded by your Flash files. If your Flash file loads an HTML file, an XML file, another SWF file, etc., Google will separately index that resource, but it will not yet be considered to be part of the content in your Flash file.”

By: Alagu Irulappan

Alagu Irulappan — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 05:51:48 +0000

Hoping that we have played it by the rules here is an answer to to the contest …

A game for “Fleximagically searchable”
http://labs.heymath.com/Fleximagically%20Searchable/

By: polyGeek

polyGeek — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 05:32:08 +0000

Oh, one question I forgot to ask: the term ‘fleximagically searchable’ has to be loaded dynamically, correct? I’m trying to keep the term off my homepage but what about deepLinks that might go to a page that displays the term? I think deepLinking is a ‘user interaction’. Do you?

By: polyGeek

polyGeek — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 05:15:35 +0000

Hey Ryan, good idea to spur on the experimentation with SWF indexing. It would be great to win the contest but the attempt itself is worth the effort. I’ve already learned a great deal about SWFAddress, PHP, etc. Enough to fill a new blog full with info.

By: jdavid.net

jdavid.net — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 17:41:11 +0000

I am concerned that this will open up linking to only SEO content, rather than allowing developers to better deep link innovative content. Flex Builder is a great tool, and so is Flex, but Flex still generates files that are much to large to enjoy. We develop all of our code for socialhelix in raw AS3 as it creates compiled files that are 10x-100x smaller than Flex files.

By: Flex SEO Contest; I'm running out of titles | zedia flash blog

Flex SEO Contest; I'm running out of titles | zedia flash blog — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 03:31:51 +0000

[...] my latest post have been about the Flex SEO contest, I’m sorry for those that don’t have interest in it, but I find it very challenging and [...]

By: Brian Ussery

Brian Ussery — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 19:12:04 +0000

Grrrreat idea Ryan, can’t wait to see the results! Please let me know if I can help…

@ zedia.net – I’m pretty sure Google is in the process of rolling out an update to index SWFObject that wasn’t included in the July 1 “launch” of the new algorithm.

@shan – Wanted to point out, “Toolbar PageRank” is only updated a few times a year, so it may not be visible at the end of the contest.

@all – “Deep linking” is still a problem for engines, I bet the best deep linker wins!

Best of luck to everyone! : )