Was hotlinking that bad?

[pixelsafari]

I've always known that hotlinking images isn't great. You're having a lot of faith that the original host isn't going to delete the image or go offline, and adding an asset to your site that you have literally no control over isn't the smartest thing in the world. Especially in the context of graphics sites, where you're expected to be a reliable source and know that people will hotlink to you often.

But aside from the risk of broken images/seeing unwanted content, I never really saw much issue with it? I know it might take up bandwidth, but the amount seems pretty marginal, and is a non-issue (as far as I'm aware) if the original host isn't even paying for their website/image hosting, like with Tumblr blogs.

So I was always a bit confused when I saw people in older websites get surprisingly aggressive when they tell people not to hotlink. Until I stumbled onto this website when I was poking around the web, and saw their explanation for it.

Netiquette

"Yes, you MUST download the images, then FTP or upload them to your own ISP. No, you cannot just link to my server to display the images at your site - nor in your chat program, your email, or anywhere else.

This holds true everywhere on the Web -- unless the owner of the Home Page has specifically given you permission to direct-link, you absolutely, positively MUST NOT do it. In other words: Do not include anyone else's URL in the BODY BACKGROUND or IMG SRC tags. The same holds true for all other files as well: text files, sound files, etc.

Many people pay their ISP for storage space; some also have to pay for additional hits over the ISP's standard rate. If you direct-link to their ISP, that means they are paying for visitors to their own site -- and are paying for visitors to YOUR site. In addition, when a web browser has to seek out several servers for images, the display time for the Page slows down considerably. If you don't know how to save or set up an image on your Home Page, ask the person whose Page it is on.

. . .

Many web sites frequently change the names of their graphics to thwart such attempts -- your visitors will then see broken images. Other websites will replace the image with a graphic that announces to the world that you are a bandwidth thief. When you are caught, you will almost always be turned into your ISP, and you may find yourself without your Home Page as a result of your abuse. A claim of "I didn't know better," "I only have WebTV and can't download," or "My free ISP doesn't give me enough storage space" is insufficient defense - just don't do it."

[close]

(Mind that the website is from 1995 and that text hadn't been updated in over 10 years)

The first thought that I had was how... serious it is? It sounds like those old PSAs about movie piracy. Not that I'm disregarding hotlinking as an issue: the internet was much slower (and probably more expensive) back then, so it's understandable to be a bit defensive over your bandwidth.

Aside from that: hosting images through your ISP??? People did that? The paragraph about being outed as a 'bandwidth thief' and having your website deleted honestly sounds more like a creepypasta than something that could happen. Was this actually a super widespread problem and I've just never heard of it or this just being exaggerated? Has it gotten better now?

Personally I don't think it's too big a problem, so long as it's from a trusted source (ie. someone who won't replace the images with something horrible to spite you) and you don't mind the risk of broken images. But maybe I'm wrong? I'd like to hear your thoughts.

[Gans]

In the stoneage participating on the internet was reeeeeally expensive. If your coins drop per MB or per minute, you really consider optimising.

However it implies, that the website operator had to pay per MB of generated traffic.

From today's viewpoint: Appalling conditions. Thankfully, these times are over.

I can imagine that the "Free Software" idea hasn't risen that far in the mid 90s yet. So "Counter Piracy" was more the default mindset on the net (just assuming).

[Melooon]

Aside from that: hosting images through your ISP??? People did that?

Back in the day when you signed up for the internet (usually with your telephone company), they would also provide you with an e-mail address and a small web hosting space for your homepage (in the same way that they were expected to provide you with a phone number, phone book and your own entry in the phone book so people could look you up).

Both my parents actually still use the e-emails they got from the telephone company back in the 90s And some smaller or more rural providers still do this! (Totaly off-topic, but some email providers like Fastmail still give you free homepage hosting with your e-mail too!)

These days bandwidth is essentially free, so hotlinking is only an issue if you're worried about images breaking. In general hotlinking from neocities sites is quite safe since MOST don't get deleted - but I'd stress it's really important not to delete or reorganise your site if you know people are hotlinking media from you (This has been a real issue with webgardens, people delete their garden and it messes up everyone's greenhouses!!)

[Cobra!]

On my personal website at least, I only hotlink if it's a button/link to another site, so if said site goes down, I'll know, and I can remove the link.

[arcus]

Some hosts back in the day would take your site down if you went past their bandwidth limits. A lot of these sites had monthly limits, so sites could go down for up to a month.

[EtherealSerah]

Gosh, I remember hotlinking still being a faux-pas in the mid-2000s! Things were changing rapidly and by then many people had moved onto Livejournal/MySpace/Bebo/etc, so it was definitely less of a concern than it was back in the mid-90s, but those of us who still kept our own small, hobbyist websites still needed to be pretty economical with bandwidth. I dislike doing it to this day unless it's something I've uploaded myself to somewhere like Postimage.

[xandra]

Some hosts back in the day would take your site down if you went past their bandwidth limits. A lot of these sites had monthly limits, so sites could go down for up to a month.

i still have flashbacks of the "509 bandwidth limit exceeded" error that i kept getting on some of my earliest domains due to my webhost! 

[pixelsafari]

Things were so different back then. Thanks for sharing all your insight! I think old internet culture is super interesting, but unfortunately it's not usually the kind of thing you can read about on Wikipedia. Or maybe I just need to read Wikipedia more

- but I'd stress it's really important not to delete or reorganise your site if you know people are hotlinking media from you

This has been a super big problem with Tumblr blogs specifically for some reason? It feels like at least half of the dead links I find are from Tumblr. Especially with mod and custom content creators for video games: it's super common for them to delete entire blogs or swathes of old content for the slightest reason. It makes tracking down old custom content even harder than it already is. I think it's just something to do with the culture around deletion there.

On my personal website at least, I only hotlink if it's a button/link to another site, so if said site goes down, I'll know, and I can remove the link.

That's pretty clever. It would make managing large button walls way easier

[debleb]

This has been a super big problem with Tumblr blogs specifically for some reason? It feels like at least half of the dead links I find are from Tumblr. Especially with mod and custom content creators for video games: it's super common for them to delete entire blogs or swathes of old content for the slightest reason. It makes tracking down old custom content even harder than it already is. I think it's just something to do with the culture around deletion there.

perhaps it has something to do with how common it is to change your tumblr username? i'd hope they have some system to redirect a link to an old username to a new one but if not then that would cause a lot of dead links i imagine