Google adds feature to link content to its author
Search giant is now supporting the authorship markup available in HTML5, which can be used by Web sites to link stories from a particular author to that author's bio and other relevant pages.
Google users interested in the work of a particular author or writer should now find it easier to track down that person's articles, stories, and bio.
Starting yesterday, the search giant started supporting a feature in HTML5 that allows Web sites to link content from a particular writer to that writer's bio or other relevant pages.
As one example cited by Google engineer Othar Hansson in a blog posted yesterday, The New York Times could use the special authorship markup tag to link every story by a particular reporter to that reporter's bio page, which could then include links to other stories and information about that person.
In essence, it's also a way of incorporating a particular author in the search results rather than just the articles that author writes. As part of the search results, authors could even be used as a way to rank different pages and sites.
"We know that great content comes from great authors, and we're looking closely at ways this markup could help us highlight authors and rank search results," wrote Hansson in the blog.
Google has already worked with several Web sites to set up the necessary HTML code, including CNET, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Entertainment Weekly, and The New Yorker. The company has also added the authorship tag to content hosted on YouTube and Blogger.