polarmate
05-01-2004, 11:52/11:52AM
Saumil, you could start with an experiment to see if the major SEs follow the W3C recommendations about embedded objects. (emphasis is mine) http://www.w3.org/TR/html401/struct/objects.html#h-13.3.1 A user agent must interpret an OBJECT element according to the following precedence rules:
1. The user agent must first try to render the object. It should not render the element's contents, but it must examine them in case the element contains any direct children that are PARAM elements (see object initialization) or MAP elements (see client-side image maps).
2. If the user agent is not able to render the object for whatever reason (configured not to, lack of resources, wrong architecture, etc.), it must try to render its contents.
Authors should not include content in OBJECT elements that appear in the HEAD element.
...<snip>...
In the following example, we embed several OBJECT declarations to illustrate how alternate renderings work. A user agent will attempt to render the first OBJECT element it can, in the following order: (1) an Earth applet written in the Python language, (2) an MPEG animation of the Earth, (3) a GIF image of the Earth, (4) alternate text.
<P> <!-- First, try the Python applet -->
<OBJECT title="The Earth as seen from space"
classid="http://www.observer.mars/TheEarth.py">
<!-- Else, try the MPEG video -->
<OBJECT data="TheEarth.mpeg" type="application/mpeg">
<!-- Else, try the GIF image -->
<OBJECT data="TheEarth.gif" type="image/gif">
<!-- Else render the text -->
The <STRONG>Earth</STRONG> as seen from space.
</OBJECT>
</OBJECT>
</OBJECT>
If the SEs do follow the alternate rendering as recommended then the text is valid HTML that can be used for SEO purposes. However, the caveat would remain: do not abuse the alternate text. Also remember that text and screen readers will read out the alternate text if they follow this recommendation, too.
I have not seen this being discussed as a method to SEO flash sites on the forums I frequent. Therefore I have no clue if the SEs honor this method or if it works.
The other thing that you could do is use a script to call the flash file and use the noscript tag for SEO purpose. The use of the noscript tag without the script tag is considered spam so take care to avoid that route.