Image hotlinking... why?

Read above posts - but in essence it's posting an image on a forum when it's still being hosted by somebody else. Bandwidth is being stolen. And as said it's not good form, so they replace the image with something dire. I seem to remember one instance of tub **** being the replaced image :/

Oh I must admit i'm very guilty of that so best do to imageshack then?

I always have seen no hotlinking but never thought to ask what it was. usually I just give the URL anyway but thanks for the heads up. Another internet mystery solved :D
 
you wouldn't say that if you were paying for hosting and you had a monthly bandwidth cap. then someone hotlinks an image and your bandwidth charges skyrocket and you have to pay $$$. or even worse, you reach your cap and your site is taken offline until you pay up. think about it..... :)


Could that happen bandwidth is peanuts these days.
 
that's not the point. not everybody is signed up with unlimited/large bandwidth allowances.


If you put up a funny picture then people will link to it. Explain the difference between hotlinking and posting the URL? going to the site will use up more bandwidth than the picture alone.

Moral is don't link to a funny mem if you are on bandwidth limits.
 
Explain the difference between hotlinking and posting the URL? going to the site will use up more bandwidth than the picture alone.

Moral is don't link to a funny mem if you are on bandwidth limits.

Adverts.
If you hotlink an image everyone that visits the thread will download it.
If you post a link, not as many people will click it.
 
All it takes is a plugin in the browser. Right click, send the imageshack. A new tab opens up with the image hosted in imageshack. Takes 5 seconds, almost as quick as right click and properties
 
If you put up a funny picture then people will link to it. Explain the difference between hotlinking and posting the URL? going to the site will use up more bandwidth than the picture alone.

Moral is don't link to a funny mem if you are on bandwidth limits.

You are missing the point. You don't have to give a URL to the page containing the image you want to display, or a direct URL to the image on that page.

It goes like this (without browser plugin).

1) Find the image you want (you have to do this anyway, if you want to hotlink or not).

2) Download the image to your hard drive.

3) Upload the image to a dedicated image hosting site.

4) Post the given URL within IMG tags in to your forum posts (you have to do this anyway, if you want to hotlink or not).

5) Delete downloaded image from your hard drive.

Job done :)
 
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As someone who owns a site that is regularly hotlinked from, I can assure you that the extra expense *I* have to take out of *my* pocket is not welcome because others can't be bothered to host it themselves.
 
I remember where there was an image a load of people were using on myspace replaced with a famous shock picture (which has been censored here), it was viewed by 25,000 people in 2 days so pretty good going really, no surprise hot linking isn't allowed here but imageshack is easy enough to use anyway
 
have you got a link for that plug-in? sounds useful :)

http://reg.imageshack.us/content.php?page=extension

Only works with FF 2 though so I edited one of the install files and now it should work in any version, made it direct too. (may need to turn off the requirement for secure updates to install it, google)

http://rapidshare.com/files/125639092/imageshackrc-0.3.6.xpi

You are missing the point. You don't have to give a URL to the page containing the image you want to display, or a direct URL to the image on that page.

It goes like this (without browser plugin).

1) Find the image you want (you have to do this anyway, if you want to hotlink or not).

2) Download the image to your hard drive.

3) Upload the image to a dedicated image hosting site.

4) Post the given URL within IMG tags in to your forum posts (you have to do this anyway, if you want to hotlink or not).

5) Delete downloaded image from your hard drive.

Job done :)
1) Find the image you want (you have to do this anyway, if you want to hotlink or not).

2) Upload the image to a dedicated image hosting site using remote upload

3) Post the given URL within IMG tags in to your forum posts (you have to do this anyway, if you want to hotlink or not).

:)
 
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Some of the posts in this thread clearly show how ignorant some can be about hotlinking. Think about it. If you are paying X amount per month for bandwidth and someone decides to hotlink your image to a forum where potentially thousands could be viewing it daily your gonna be paying for it. What adds to injury is the host will most likely be totally unaware where the image has been hotlinked.

Bandwidth you silly people - IT COSTS MONEY
 
you wouldn't say that if you were paying for hosting and you had a monthly bandwidth cap. then someone hotlinks an image and your bandwidth charges skyrocket and you have to pay $$$. or even worse, you reach your cap and your site is taken offline until you pay up. think about it..... :)

I use maybe 50GB of my 200GB monthly limit, so hotlink away from my website :p
 
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