duncg - 11:20 am on Sep 2, 2006 (gmt 0)

I have a similar situation to that of webmaster world where the data i would like the search enignes to spider is password protected but however you do not have to pay to access the data just set up an account.

Has anybody had any bad experiences with using cloaking for this purpose? Or are there any 'official' guidlines for this from any of the SEs etc?

Does webmaster world and NYT get 'special' treatment or do the SEs really not find this a problem?

As I am not trying to fool the search engines in anyway, I have a mass of data I would like to be indexed as it is of use to people, they just have to sign up to access it.