Talk:Inline linking

Redirected from Bandwidth theft
Bandwidth theft has been redirected here as per Articles for deletion/Bandwidth theft, there were several votes to merge the contents over to this article if anyone wants the task. Jtkiefer T - 23:28, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

Redirected from Hotlink
Is it appropriate for this to be the redirect from Hotlink? I would expect Hotlink to redirect to Hypertext. At the least, can we have a link somewhere to History of hypertext for fuller understanding of where the practice came from? There is no History section in this article, which seems to provide a very one-sided idea of it necessarily being a Bad Thing (and which appears to violate NPOV). Aerowolf (talk) 17:37, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

Naming
Clearly "direct linking" is more appropriate term; "inline" just doesn't ring a bell with most people. I've been doing web programming for years and it took me longer than normal to decode what this article was about -- it was simply about direct linking, and "inline linking" was just a confusing synonym. Ninjagecko 12:13, 28 June 2006 (UTC)Ninjagecko

-- addition -- The term "Inline linking" is most commonly used for the kind of links Wikipedia itself uses - i.e. a link inline with the text; a link that wraps around key words in a paragraph or sentence. What you've described on this page is NOT inline, but "direct" (even that's cagey and unclear) or something else clearer like 'offsite image grabs'. Calling it inline makes absolutely no sense. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.136.163.17 (talk) 13:13, 24 June 2009


 * I usually call them "dark links", can anyone comment on this name? 66.199.46.12 (talk) 14:48, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

The term that Wikipedia uses for what this article describes is "transclusion".

Merge both with "hotlinking"?
I'd like to see this and direct linking merged and formed into a new category: "Hotlinking". It's the most commonly used term AFAIK. David n m bond 15:07, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

I also would like to see them merged with "Hotlinking". This is the term I have heard most often; I'd never heard any of the others before. Seaheart317 02:34, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

While I agree that "Hotlinking" is the more commonly used now to describe Inline Linking, I believe that "Hotlinking," especially the word "hot link" is an outdated term for what we now call a "link." S4xton 15:37 25 January 2006 (UTC)

What about "remote linking"? It's the most commonly used term today, especially among free web hosting providers themselves. --J.L.W.S. The Special One 06:09, 23 April 2006 (UTC)


 * Don't all of these terms refer to text hyperlinks? The article is mainly about IMG tags. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.72.235.91 (talk) 18:47, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

I would like to see a merge of the articles under hotlinking with a distinction being made between the authorized and unauthorized use as both articles are muddy on the point. I would have to say that "hotlinking" is the most common usage in the vernacular today for an object request (generally an image) from one server by another. It is far different than and ordinary link as it performs a get on the object at page load as opposed to being clicked (thus the link is “hot”). The terms leeching, bandwidth theft, or bandwidth rape are associated with this as an unauthorized negative activity. Remote linking and direct linking are generally associated with this as an authorized activity. --Roblem 17:16, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

I do not think that they should be merged. An "inline link" that would be considered bandwidth theft is frowned upon by every personal website owner that I know. However, "direct links", which go to HTML files (it is important that it does not link directly to other media), promote the user to browse the site, bringing traffic. This is almost always appreciated, even when it is not a link to the "index" or "intro" page.
 * Is there any evidence that those terms are used as described? IMHO there ought to be one article, which says that "inline/hot/direct/deep linking is linking from one page to a specific document or media item on another site. Generally links to HTML pages are encouraged, but links to media may be considered theft". Simple, eh? Stevage 07:50, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

I agree with the previous posters definitions, but fail to see why these should be one article when they are such clearly separate concepts.

Alternative terms
Has anyone ever heard of terms like "Raping the bandwidth", or "Bandwidth rape" used in similar context?--DooM Drat 07:51, 8 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Even the repeated use of "bandwidth theft" in the article comes of as extremely alarmist to me. Hyperlinks are just hyperlinks; there's no "proper" way to organize what constitutes a "site" or a "web page".  (Hence, why *everything* has a unique URL.)  All of this webmaster complaining that people "hot linking" or "deep linking" doesn't conform to their "vision" (regardless of anyone else's "vision") of their web page is completely childish and malinformed.  Good thing there's always Greasemonkey. 71.162.255.58 18:20, 7 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Regardless of the term, the article should also describe the other viewpoint: not everyone considers it theft, that placing a public URL on a public HTTP server means that it can and should be downloaded and used freely, and that if you don't want it hotlinked you should protect it via other means.63.139.189.114 16:23, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

No vote
I would consider "deep linking" and "bandwidth theft" to be different things that should be handled separately. One is simply directing traffic to a site via a normal link. The other is using another site as a free image storage site without actually sending it any traffic. MichaelSH 23:31, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

How about "Hotlinking makes Jimbo Wales feel all sad inside."?--Edtropolis 19:38, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Merging with direct linking
This merger has been proposed and having read both articles I agree that this might be a good idea. Perhaps leaving direct linking as a redirect to this page. __meco 07:33, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Merging Direct linking seems sensible to me. Thayvian 00:03, 30 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Inline linking and direct linking are different things (also thinking about "bandwidth theft" and legal affairs). --ChemicalBit 15:42, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

Replace with article on inline linking
As I understand it, inline linking is the practice of including links inline (e.g. within a paragraph body rather than in a separate list). There is a certain amount of controversy over whether this practice is desirable or not from an accessibility/readability point of view.

Therefore, I recommend that anything useful in the present article be removed to wherever it is relevant and a new article on the subject of inline linking be placed here.

Wikipedia policy
Perhaps add a link to the Wikipedia policy on hotlinking as perhaps examples of a site's policy. However, presently all one can find is commons:Commons:Reusing_content_outside_Wikimedia and Wikipedia_talk:Images. Jidanni 21:47, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Flagged for mention of remote loading
I'm flagging this article because it is in need of a mention of "remote loading." You can remote load an image from someone else's website without their permission, in which case it is bandwidth theft, or you can remote load it legitimately from a file hosting account. Many website hosting terms of service use the phrase remote loading in the context that they will or won't allow it. See this Google search for "remote loading" glossary. When this is fixed, go ahead and remove the flag. 5Q5 (talk) 21:49, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

legality of hotlinking?
I think it would be interesting to have a bit about how the law sees hotlinking and such --TiagoTiago (talk) 13:53, 28 February 2008 (UTC)


 * It is already a crime punishable by death by the internet nazis. --1sneakers6 (talk) 08:22, 16 March 2009 (UTC)


 * The articel suggests that "An article on one site may refer to copyrighted images or content on another site, avoiding rights and ownership issues that copying the original files might raise."
 * "When the image from another web site is incorporated into one's own page by means of an unauthorized IMG link, there is no direct copying by the creator of the link. Nonetheless, when the visiting browser retrieves the image from the other web site and combines it with the text on the current page, the creator of the web site may be guilty of contributory copyright infringement for creating a derivative work."
 * Src = http://www.bitlaw.com/internet/webpage.html#linking —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.178.171.34 (talk) 09:26, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

theft vs. stealing
isn't the term 'Bandwidth Stealing' used, too? --Itu (talk) 19:19, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

Not phrased correctly?
The article currently has a sentence that reads: "An article on one site may refer to copyrighted images or content on another site, avoiding rights and ownership issues that copying the original files might raise, although this practice is generally not accepted."

I think the word "refer" is misleading here, as is the word "avoiding." Unless I'm misunderstanding something, shouldn't this be...

An article on one site may inline copyrighted images or content by hotlinking them from another site; there might be an assumption that this somehow avoids the copyright issues that direct copying would entail, although this is not at all clear.

...or something like that. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.243.22.130 (talk) 15:49, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Further Disambiguation
The terms "HOTlink" and "HOTlink II" also refer to high speed data interfaces, see for example this Google search or this example product. George Dishman (talk) 09:30, 20 November 2012 (UTC)