[thelist] Another interesting encounter with Google listings (was: An interesting encounter with thelist archive ...)

[David Bindel]

> Anyway ... my FYI is this. I recently got word that the
> developers of the site had been googling to check its
> ranking and came across the site-check discussion on the
> evolt.org/archive.
>
> So, I pass along this heads up, you never know when your old
> posts will come back to haunt you.;-)

I recently had a problem similar to this.  One of my clients actually
demanded that I remove the link to his website from my portfolio.  Why?
My portfolio page appeared in Google's results whenever someone searched
for his company name, and on my webpage I admit to being 16 years old.
Apparently this had caused one of his customers to back out of a $250
sale because the customer "did not trust the work of a 16 year old."

By the way, I'm not your average 16 year-old Frontpage-wielding web
designer... I've read the W3C recommendations, I hand-code *valid* XHTML
1.1, CSS, and PHP through Notepad, and I strive to make the websites as
accessible as possible (table-less, fluid layout through CSS, WCAG Level
Double-A, etc.), so please don't make the assumption that I'm "just a
kid" because I'm 16.

Anyways, my client told me to either remove my age from my own website
(it's a personal site for crying out loud!) or remove his website from
my portfolio.  Do any of y'all have suggestions for my situation?


TIA,
David Bindel