Question Search engine listing of posts. (answered)

[Nikephoros]

Is there a facility on RPF to block posts/replies from being listed on search engines?

Other forums allow users to specify whether posts made from a particular profile are visible to search engines.

If this topic has been covered in previous posts, please direct me to the appropriate thread.

 

[Art Andrews]

We block content from the Junkyard and Off-Topic forums but don't allow any other content to be blocked. If you have examples of this, I'd be interested in reviewing links to sites that allow it, but I can tell you that we would not be inclined to implement something like that. Still, it never hurts to look.

 

[Nikephoros]

One example:

I commented on a featured artist on RPF's Facebook presence. Searching for my username in Google resulted in a link to that feature and my comment (despite my Facebook profile being hidden). I then chose to enable Facebook's "exclude my Facebook profile from public search engines" option. Subsequent posts did not appear in Google search results.

Could an option like this be implemented on therpf.com; effectively blocking specific user content from search engine listing only, not blocking the content itself?

 

[Art Andrews]

There may be an add-on like that, but if so, I haven't seen it. Even if there was, we would not be inclined to allow members to disallow content from being searchable as it limits the ability of future potential RPFers from finding us via Google.

 

[Nikephoros]

I certainly understand that.

I should add that I discovered therpf.com through Adam Savage's Maltese Falcon presentation.

You could always implement it as an opt-in privacy feature? i.e. disabled by default.

 

[Art Andrews]

Was that Adam's video on TED? I love that video!

While Facbook has caught a lot of flak due to privacy issues and the very personal nature of the Facebook platform, it isn't common practice for forums like ours to allow individual opt out or to implement a policy which would limit Google's ability to search each member's postings.

Out of curiosity, since you have the ability to create a persona and user name here which gives you a considerable amount of anonimity, what is the concern you have with Google indexing your posts?

 

[DaddyfromNaboo]

You can always have your user name changed.

Michael
RPF staff