Since I started Web-publishing, I have always heard that iframes are not a recommended solution for your Website: For some reason, they were evil, and the W3C was not approving its use as a “best practice”. I would hear that search engines crawlers hated it too.
Well, things might be changing up in here. First, a few weeks back, we could read on Inside Facebook that Facebook was actually moving away from FBML and closer to iframes. If the number one Website in the world starts to use iframes massively, I think we will all start to re-consider the W3C stand towards iframes.
Recently, Youtube has also started to test iframes for its embeds. Hence, instead of a javascript, Youtube also suggests its users to grab an iframe to embed a video wherever they want on the Web. Facebook, then Youtube, it’s already half the Web that’s turning towards iframes.
Personally, I have always had trust in iframes. The element in the sidebar of this blog is an iframe (it’s even iframes in an iframe). When you come to think about it, iframes are probably more reliable than javascript, because they can run on a javascript-disabled Webpage, and I have a feeling that iframes are just lighter and more universal than javascript embeds.