Flash is suitable for SEO ?

[chatsfun]

I am having problem with my website, i tried to find my seo ranking it shows that flash has a negative impact on seo  so is this true does flash affects the seo ?

[Here is the list of all Adobe forums... https://forums.adobe.com/welcome]

[Moved from Captivate to a Flash forum... Mod]

[Test Screen Name]

Yes, a huge effect. Flash is going to die very soon, remove it urgently from your web site.

[Robert Mc Dowell]

no flash won't die since millions of people still and want to use it for the past, present and future.

flash is not only video but companies, developers who developed since 20 years complex applications that

simply cannot be possible to do in HTML5/javascript

flash will transit in another shape than a plugin, ex webassembly.

Also that's not true it has any effect on SEO since SEO is based on metatags, if it is

please provide any real proof of it.

[Test Screen Name]

So you don't believe that, when Adobe stop making Flash Player available in 2020, that it will have any negative effect on  people using Flash? You think that a seamless replacement will appear, will work with major browsers, will be accepted by end users and IT as safe, and will require no changes to sites using Flash content?

SEO is a dark art because search engine strategies are secret. They rely on much more than metatags, in fact many ignore metatags. For example, Official Google Webmaster Central Blog: Google does not use the keywords meta tag in web ranking . Is a Google official blog real proof, I don't know. You disagree with the authors of 10 Basic SEO Tips To Get You Started - Business Insider  when they give the simple advice "Avoid Flash"?

[Robert Mc Dowell]

no I don't believe to all of this, and don't agree with all you said. As I said and repeated many times

all of this is not technically related but much more political... When you decided to use a language, it's not to tell to the people 20 years after it's not good, stop to use it. So imagine to do that with javascript, java, perl, C etc... every language has security issues, every browser has security issues, nothing is 100% secure with any electronic device, so why flash is targeted so badly if it's not only a political decision? websassembly is a standard and already adopted by all major browsers. Many developers (adobe team included)

are working hard to embed flash technology into webassembly, and when I mean flash technology, it's nothing more than actionscript and SWF. so the "plugin" problem will be resolved soon.

About SEO, yest it's a dark tech, no it's not art, it's just another political algorithm.

[Test Screen Name]

I don't quite follow your argument. Are you saying that

* It's wrong for Adobe to take away flash, so they won't follow up on their promise to take it away?

or

* Since SWF is a public specification, some one else will produce product to replace Flash, and you expect a seamless transition to this so Flash sites will have to do nothing or

* Since SWF is a public specification, some one else will produce product to replace Flash, and developers will be able to make it work with some effort or

* Something else

The difference is crucial to countless web site developers.

[Robert Mc Dowell]

The main problem of the majority of developers is that they cannot see beyond technical points, which is naive. it goes directly in political and strategical decisions once the technology is mature, which is widely the case of Flash.

* It's wrong for Adobe to take away flash, so they won't follow up on their promise to take it away?

you didn't catch it. I advise you to look at webassembly on search engine.

* Since SWF is a public specification, some one else will produce product to replace Flash, and developers will be able to make it work with some effort or Something else

what do you think? millions of people, companies and developers will just give up?

[Test Screen Name]

So, as a passive user of Flash technologies on a web site, what is your advice to me? What can I do today to ensure the usefulness of my site into the future?

[Robert Mc Dowell]

well, to be passive as a developer is not really good already, like other language like javascript or other for the web.

but, if you really don't like to code, so just wait. If you are curious of how the web evolves, just get involved and learn.

[Test Screen Name]

When I am a developer. I am not passive, but I work to deliver solutions for others; if the tools and targets move on, the customers go away, or their wishes cannot be fulfilled, and I adapt.

However, there are countless web sites where someone paid a long-departed developer to create content, and it is still there in Flash. My concern is chiefly for these people (I think developers will still scratch a living somehow). Hence my question: do you foresee a solution where their Flash content continues to function, with no developer input? If not, if they have to find and pay a developer again, why wouldn't they pay to adapt to other technologies instead?

[Robert Mc Dowell]

users are usually not developers and just don't understand what's behind the scene.

if a King says "our country is bankrupt", so many people will resign, but always a few percentage will say that the king has no authority

on their life.

> do you foresee a solution where their Flash content continues to function, with no developer input?

again, nothing will stop in one day, adobe and browsers are not so crazy....

inform yourself, research, don't follow the cattle, there is not ONE technology for ALL, but ALL technologies for ONE.

now for sure once Flash will evolve as another shape than a plugin, depend how developers will make it but maybe there will be some little

change to do in javascript to embed the swf into the html page, example swfObject.

example: majority of developers and users would say flash is not working on android and ios. Wrong. check Puffin browser,or create a link on your website that jumps to an adobe air application, code is the same.

The morality is that you cannot force people to reprogram millions of code that is working well by the simple fact that some guys just decided to break the evolution to another way. it's always users who decide. But for sure they will use all the tools they control, like media, browsers, articles and false statistics to convince users they are right.

[Test Screen Name]

Thanks for sharing your outlook. I respect it but won’t change my advice for now.