Hidden Links in Javascript

[Ellio]

Further to Greeneagles recent post I am now wondering if links placed in free javascript source code could be treated as hidden links by Google?

A few of our pages use a free scripts found on the web that have a link in brackets to the authors site in the introduction before the main part of the script.

We have seen a major serps drop off for some of these pages in the last week and feel this may be related....

Any views on this?

[bhartzer]

free javascript source code could be treated as hidden links by Google?

No, they're not hidden links--or at least Google wouldn't treat them as hidden links.

Hidden links implies that you have links on your page that Google can follow but are hidden to the users. Google doesn't follow javascript links.

[Ellio]

Thanks thats very helpful.

[gleearch]

I could be wrong but I remember reading a post somewhere on this forum about how some spiders do not recognize links if they are part of a javascript. Mouseovers etc.
I don't think those are considered hidden links.