Is it wrong to do this?

redirection on mouseover...

[tfanelli]

I was approached by a company about search optimization. I did some research and found that they don't exactly do things totally, what I would consider ethical, so I wont be using them. But they did do something I have never seen before and wondered if it is spamming or cloaking. Heres the deal: first of they use transparent gif on the home page to link to optimized pages. I know this is not legal with the enignes (transparent gifs). What they did that was interesting is a pseudo cloaking attempt. The pages they link to with the gifs are only visible for a split second because they use an "onmouseover" event in Java to redirect you to their homepage. In essence its cloaking because the search engine sees this page and indexes it but the user sees the homepage. My question is this: Is that tactic considered spamming or cloaking by the engines?

I would never do this, Im just curious. Its actually very cheesy because you clearly see the other page load for a split sec.

[pageoneresults]

My question is this: Is that tactic considered spamming or cloaking by the engines?

I think it would be seen as an attempt to influence the SE and therefore not fall under that particular SEs guidelines. Is it spam? Probably. Is it cloaking? Who knows. Spam and cloaking are two completely different venues although one usually compliments the other. But, not in all cases. ;)

If you can see it, so can your competitors. In this day and age it appears that there are many who will quickly report abuse such as what you describe. So, if you want to take the chance (not you personally), then you take the chance. Is it worth tarnishing the brand? Is it worth the risk?