httpwebwitch - 1:10 pm on Apr 30, 2008 (gmt 0)

Introducing another awkward facet: Does Googlebot index little HTML fragments, those served up by REST services for AJAX consumption? For instance, I have some Javascript on a page waiting for user interaction, and all it does is load up a fragment of information (a paragraph or two) for insertion into the DOM. Being RESTful, it does live at a permanent indexable URL. Presumably, the code:content ratio of this fragment is 100%, and its keyword density is shazam! Will it be crawled, indexed and ranked?

I guess the fact that I've never seen (or more accurately, never noticed) these in SERPs might be evidence to the contrary, but just because something doesn't rank well doesn't mean it wouldn't throw a wrench into my SEO.

Indexing content only accessible via Javascript is a double-edged sword. On one hand, it makes all that AJAXian stuff findable. On the other, it could potentially fill the SERPs with kabillions of little scraps of noise.