I think the title is self explanatory. I certainly think it looks nicer. I thought it still worked for searches too, as long as it's something $\ce{H2SO4}$ or $\ce{K}_i$ - certainly does on my browser.
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$\begingroup$ I think it's fine. On Math.SE, most of the questions are like that. $\endgroup$– Daniel Node.jsAug 30, 2013 at 15:42
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$\begingroup$ See the discussion on meta.chemistry.stackexchange.com/questions/253/… for more details. $\endgroup$– jonscaAug 30, 2013 at 22:55
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2$\begingroup$ When you use something like Google or Bing, the \ce confuses the engine and it also makes the title look ugly. $\endgroup$– ManishEarthAug 31, 2013 at 7:37
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$\begingroup$ Yeah I see the problem :-) $\endgroup$– user1160Aug 31, 2013 at 8:52
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$\begingroup$ Mathjax even executes in profile section. $\endgroup$– ProscionexiumMay 21 at 16:17
2 Answers
It can be rather problematic, and we ask that you do it only when the extended markup is really needed for the meaning of your question in the title. That might be quite often, depending on the questions you ask, we just ask that you consider it.
Titles are a major part of how search engines index our content, so not only are the displayed results skewed when results turn up, it causes some posts not to turn up in results that should have produced them. We use tags as part of the title which curbs this effect a bit, but really good questions can sometimes hide behind markup heavy titles in Google.
It's not that we're worried about SEO here, it's a usability / legibility thing primarily. And, well, of course we want our most relevant content shown in results, that's why we maintain it :)
When you attempt to use the right-click context menu options to either Open in new tab or Open in new window on a title written in MathJax, the appropriate context menu does not appear as expected.
Another related minor problem with titles that are written in MathJax occurs if the Zoom Trigger is set to Click (right click on any MathJax formula → Math Settings → Zoom Trigger → Click), which may be useful when reading very small exponents or subscripts.
In this case, left-clicking a title written in MathJax does not follow the link to the question but – as designed – shows a zoom view of the title.