There has been a great deal of press over recent months regarding
Microsoft's much maligned use of Smart Tags and understandably
so. For those of you who aren't aware of Smart Tags, one of the
capabilities is to give internet browser/plugin software companies
the ability to introduce their own hyperlinks onto your web pages
- without your knowledge. This is achieved by special instructions
included with browsing software to "highlight" certain
words on your pages such as "camcorder", enticing you
to move your mouse over them. A drop down box then appears over
the highlighted word "offering" a selection of links
related to that word. If a link is selected, a visitor is transported
from your site to another. The owner of the web page has no control
over the destination, nor receives any compensation for unwittingly
providing the lead.
A note of clarification - many articles I have read have stated
that Microsoft shelved the use of "Smart Tags" after
the backlash from consumers - this is incorrect. On searching
through Microsoft's archives, I came across this excerpt dated
August 8:
"Office XP, the newest version of Office, has already delivered
on Microsoft's .NET vision with new features such as Smart Tags,
which automatically provide relevant information from within a
user's computer or from over the Internet"
http://www.microsoft.com/PressPass/features/2001/aug01/08-08pc20.asp
So while the function is supposedly being removed from within
Windows XP (for this year), Office XP still uses it. And Internet
Explorer is a part of Office XP.
A page on Microsoft's site that contained information regarding
Smart Tags has been removed recently:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/preview/smarttags/
If any of our readers can clarify this further or is using XP
and has experienced the implementation of smart tags while surfing
the Internet; I'd be very interested in hearing about it. A colleague
recently installed IE6 (stand alone) and noticed that Smart Tag
functions were an option during a custom installation.
Smart Tags do have legitimacy, such as Microsoft Word users being
able to utilise the tags to create drop down boxes with links
to other documents. The major difference being that in this case,
the author has control over implementation.
To their credit, Microsoft has also released information on how
to prevent Smart Tags from operating on your site. You will need
to insert the following lines between your <head> </head>
tags on each page:
<meta name="MSSmartTagsPreventParsing" content="TRUE">
(Thanks to "ueberdiv" for passing this on to me).
PLEASE NOTE THIS CODE WILL NOT STOP TOPTEXT OR SURF
PLUS
Microsoft is not the only company involved with the usage of
"Smart Tags". eZula (TopText) and Surf+ both use the
same kinds of technology in their plugins to "provide relevant
links to surfers"... in other words... ads...
I have enough ads on my site and would hate to annoy visitors
further with unwelcomed and uninvited parasitical software altering
the text on my pages.....
Michael Bloch
michael@tamingthebeast.net
http://www.tamingthebeast.net
Tutorials, web content and tools, software and community.
Web Marketing, eCommerce & Development solutions.
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