I have recently begun posting images and writing haiku to accompany them. It occurred to me that I ought to provide a little etiquette instruction for my readers, particularly because lots of people get into blogging who are not otherwise Internet savvy. The following definition is from Altlab.com:

Bandwidth theft or “hotlinking” is direct linking to a website’s files (images, video, etc.). An example would be using an <IMG> tag to display a JPEG image you found on someone else’s web page so it will appear on your own site, journal, weblog, forum posting, etc.

Bandwidth refers to the amount of data transferred from a website to a user’s computer. When you view a webpage, you are using that site’s data transfer to display the files. Since web hosts charge based on the amount of data transferred, bandwidth is an issue. If a site is over it’s monthly bandwidth, it’s billed for the extra data or taken offline.

A simple analogy for bandwidth theft: Imagine a random stranger plugging into your electrical outlets, using your electricity without your consent, and you paying for it.

If you have recently posted an image to your blog by hotlinking to my server, please download the image to your own server. I have uploaded an .htaccess file to my root servers to prevent hotlinking (and if I did it correctly, any hotlinked images should show a red X or blue question mark instead).

I appreciate the compliment you pay me by finding my material worthy of including on your own blog. However, I can only afford a certain amount of bandwidth and cannot support everyone else’s needs.

Update, 10:50 p.m.: I followed the instructions, but it’s working only sporadically. I may resort to other measures…