What is Direct or Hot Linking and Why It's Bad.

This article is to inform you and everyone else about direct linking or hot linking. Please read. There have been many conflicts with this among many sites and I wish to tell as many people as possible why it is bad unless permitted the the webmaster or mistress.

What?

What is direct linking? Directing linking is when you link directly to an image from another person's site. Your code usually looks like this:


<img src="http://www.randomdomain.com/theimage.jpg">

What it should look like:


<img src="http://www.yourdomain.com/theimage.jpg">

Why?

Why is this bad? It steals bandwidth from the host's site. They have to pay for that bandwidth. It is not right to steal that money from them when they are so kind to offer then for free in the first place.

How?

How can I not direct link? Well, save the image to your computer by right clicking and going to 'Save Picture As'. Then, upload the image to your host.

Exceptions

There are exceptions where a webmaster or mistress will allow you direct link to an image. They will usually provide you with a code to put on your site. That is the only time you may direct link. They have decided to give out the bandwidth. That is the only exception.

Thank you for reading this article. I hope this clarified what direct linking is, how you can not, and why it's bad.

article by: amei | August 03, 2004