[uf-discuss] Microformats search engine: virel

[Christian Heilmann]

> As far as users of microformats are concerned, the choice is (a) include
> your address and expect to get spam, (b) leave your address out, or (c)
> obscure your address. I currently favor options (b) and (c). For (c), I
> actually recommend having a human-intelligible version (e.g. 'myaddress at
> example dot com') and then - if you like - having a run-on-document-ready
> Javascript function to convert it to a mailto: link for human consumption.
>
> Crawlers - both benign and malign - typically don't execute JS, so they
> won't see the actual email address. I don't think that's a bad thing for
> reasons indicated above. Tools that actually run in a browser context,
> such as Operator, should get the right result (Operator does).
>
> Angus
>
>
>   
That's got nothing to do with microformats but when you really think 
that any obfuscation like bla dot domain is not indexed by spammers then 
you are in for a treat. There is no way to protect emails online without 
hurting usability or accessibility. Don't waste your time with 
JavaScript (de)obfuscation, it is a glass shield or - even closer - a 
pacifier button.

What you put in microformats you should be happy with to be put out 
there to be found, indexed and converted. Obfuscated microformats that 
expect the reader technology to convert it before turning it for example 
into a vcard are just a nuisance for the end user. This is about 
unearthing information we already publish and make easier to access and 
re-use it, which is the opposite of obfuscating.