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October 05, 2004

Link Etiquette?: Always Leave Something Juicy Behind

I have an rule about how links are supposed to work. I wonder if everyone agrees.

Basically, I think that when you link someone else's find or analysis, you're permitted to excerpt a taste of what they're quoting or saying, but it's always important to leave something fairly important behind to click on. After all, if you just quote all the good parts, you've left your audience with no reason to click on the link-- the blog that tipped you gets the link, for what that's worth, but very little traffic at all.*

I'm pretty good about observing this rule, although sometimes the site I've gotten something from is just a one-line mention, so it's hard to describe the article linked there and still leave something behind for a reader to click on.

Just to show you what a good guy I am, I'll mention that I once linked a one-sentence blurb from Marcland. I really couldn't leave anything behind for readers to click through to, so I scanned his site for something else interesting, and found something quickly (he has lots of interesting stuff, after all): photos of Saturn's rings from the Cassini spacecraft. So I stole his link, but then linked to something that was just on his site.

And I left out lots of good stuff in the Six Meat Buffet story I just linked-- including a link to the actual article. Yeah, in a way, I'm making it less convenient for my readers. But then, my readers are only getting the story due to Six Meat Buffet's work (assuming they didn't find the story through some other source), so, inconvenient or not, it's the tax that has to be paid to Six Meat Buffet.

My own pet peeve is when someone just republishes an entire top ten I wrote. The whole thing, start to finish. Bloggers always link me when they do this, but with 10 through 1 already published on someone else's site, what's the point of the link? Might as well call the link Honestly, there's no reason to click on these red words whatsoever. Spend your time doing something more productive, like calling your mom and thanking her for the birthday afghan. **

I also think there's gray area: What do you do when someone just quickly links an article with a one-sentence digest, but you find it more interesting and want to quote and analyze at length? It seems silly to withhold the direct link to the article from your readers in favor of linking to the blog where you found the link; and yet, if you don't do that, you're stealing traffic that the blogger-source actually earned.

Again, in that case, I think it's best to find something else interesting on that site and then link that. Link the article directly, but make sure that your actual source gets some traffic somehow.

I think that most people do observe the Thou Shalt Always Share Traffic For a News Find rule; I think most people understand it implicitly.

And I know that I have violated the rule myself. Hypocrisy is the tribute vice pays to virtue and all that. But I do try to observe it.

I'm not sure if this is an agreed-upon rule or what. It seems to be a sort-of rule, but maybe it's more of a guideline. Maybe I'm wrong.

Just tossing it out there.

* I guess Instapundit is the past-master at leaving everything behind. One tenth of Instapundit's links are just: "Heh." I don't know-- that seems to be taking the rule to extremes. "Heh."

I've dabbled with the idea of publishing no original words whatsoever on this blog whatsoever, except "Heh." No headlines, no comments. I'll just out-Instapundit Instapundit and link everything with a "Heh."

Maybe Friday.

** Ann Coulter did exactly just that to me, but given that this link actually moved me from the three-digits to four-digits of traffic after three weeks of prominent exposure.

Plus, you know, it was Ann Coulter. You don't fuck around with Ann Coulter. Lest she call you a girly-man.

posted by Ace at 12:12 AM

Comments

Trying to come up with standards is good, but I never know where I fit, 'cause when I link somebody they always end up LOSING traffic. Which I think is rude on my part.

Posted by: the UNPOPULIST on October 5, 2004 12:49 AM

Wow - sort of a traffic black hole, eh, UP? Well never mind, thanks for the link the other day.

Since I don't pay attention to my traffic, being more of a reader than a writer, if it went down, I might not notice.

And, back on topic - the standards mentioned seem quite reasonable, Ace, and I'm looking forward to the day you out-Insty the professor. Why not let Hoke do it for you as a "guest"?

Posted by: Patton on October 5, 2004 01:29 AM

Ace--

Good posting; that's sound advice I'm trying to follow, albeit not always perfectly.

However, how do you treat blatant rip-offs? I mean, Garfield Ridge wouldn't exist without the inspiration of Ace of Spades.

In fact, I like to think of my site as the Jennifer Jason Leigh to your Bridget Fonda. I even got my hair cut to look just like you!

Maybe we can be friends? Best of friends? Super-duper best friends? And together we can eat Hagen-Daz, talk about boys, and scratch out the eyes from all the supermodel pictures in Cosmo?

Or would that get weird?

Your number one fan,
Dave
Garfield Ridge

Posted by: Dave at Garfield Ridge on October 5, 2004 01:51 AM

If it's a one line deal, I usually just give a hat tip with a link to the main page, add another link to the one line post - but also link to the article. The "heh" type stuff doesn't do a lot for me. Obviously, it does for some.

When I take something from a site I always leave the meat behind, and usually a suggestion to scope out the original. If it's a quick funny bit, I may even only take a sentence and just tell people to have a look for themselves.

Posted by: Dan on October 5, 2004 02:03 AM

“You don't fuck around with Ann Coulter.”

Help me out here. I’m trying to put the akcent on the right sileyebul.

Posted by: Lastango on October 5, 2004 02:14 AM

When reading blogs, am I the only one who tends to skip over long blockquotes? I think people would rather read the original than a really long quote - so I think Ace's method is reader-friendly as well as blogger-friendly. Half the fun of reading people like Ace or Allah or Reynolds is the creative way with which they set up their links - giving just enough hint to make you want to follow it. But if there's a giant excerpt, I'm more inclined to skip it altogether. That might just be me, though.

Posted by: Johnny Walker Red on October 5, 2004 02:16 AM

I almost know what you mean, Ace. If I had a blog,
I would link the shit out of you. It is unfortunate that
neither you nor I is especially smart.

Posted by: just a man on October 5, 2004 03:17 AM

no offense.

Posted by: just a man on October 5, 2004 03:18 AM

Ace, you're linking etiquette is right on the money, but it went in one ear and out the other because you just had to bring HER into it.
Now I just can't stop thinking about Ann Coulter.
I can see her now, standing over me dressed in black leather, whip in one hand and a cowbell in the other.
"The guys get ****ing shirts, Girly Man" she'd say in that low breathy neocon voice....

Posted by: msl on October 5, 2004 08:03 AM

Can I fuck around with Ann Coulter? I'd pay good money, I'm tellin' you.

Posted by: Preston Taylor Holmes on October 5, 2004 08:08 AM

Ditto on the Coulter comments. No UM law students like her when I was there, daggummit.

New topic: Is Peggy Noonan the conservative M(you'd)LF?

Oh, and as for the linking thing, I've written the site owner to ask if I could copy a whole post before. If they give permission, I will. That's with things that are really good that my friends (who are sadly the only people who visit my blog) shouldn't miss like letters from service people in Iraq who are sharing their experiences. Most people are pretty cool about it, so far. And, I have linked back to those sites multiple times on different topics as a hook-up.

Hope that makes sense.

Posted by: Birkel on October 5, 2004 09:51 AM

To answer Birkel: Yes on Noonan.

To top Ace: I'm just linking everything with the word "Ha".

Posted by: Senator PhilABuster on October 5, 2004 12:08 PM

Hey Birkel, I visited your blog. And I'm not your friend.

Posted by: Phil on October 5, 2004 12:28 PM

Ace, I've been a blogger less than two months and ask only patience. I think there are lots of new bloggers who don't know the etiquette (trackbacks with no link to the source?). I've tried to pick up all the rules quickly thanks to posts like this, and others from DEan and Bill INDC. Hell, I now suffer from trackbacks with no link back to me, but there's plenty of slack to go around.

Now the juicy part...a link from Ann Coulter? I can just imagine the sound of new bloggers like me as we bow before you and chant "we're not worthy".

Posted by: SteveL on October 5, 2004 12:49 PM

Phil, you don't have to be so harsh. I'm honored to have you as my guest. And to be Ace's.

Posted by: Birkel on October 5, 2004 02:05 PM

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What? Skeleton of the most famous Musketeer, D'Artagnan, possibly discovered in Dutch church closet.
Dumas picked four names of real musketeers out of a history book, D'Artagnan, Athos, Aramis, and Porthos. So there was an actual D'Artagnan, though he made most of the story up. (Or, you know, all of it.)*

Charles de Batz de Castelmore, known as d'Artagnan, the famous musketeer of Kings Louis XIII and Louis XIV, spent his life in the service of the French crown.
The Gascon nobleman inspired Alexandre Dumas's hero in "The Three Musketeers" in the 19th century, a character now known worldwide thanks to the novel and numerous film adaptations.
D'Artagnan was killed during the siege of Maastricht in 1673, and there is a statue honoring the musketeer in the city. His final resting place has remained a mystery ever since.

A lot of Dumas's stories are based on bits of real history. The plot of the >Three Musketeers, about trying to recover lost diamonds from the queen's necklace, was cribbed from the then-almost-contemporaneous Affair of the Queen's Necklace. And the Man in the Iron Mask is based on real accounts of a prisoner forced to wear a mask (though I think it was a velvet mask).
* Oh, I should mention, Dumas says all this, about finding the names in an old book, in the prologue to his novel. But authors lie a lot. They frequently present fictions as based on historic fact. The twist is, he was actually telling the truth here. At least about these four musketeers having actually existed and served under Louis XIV.
Fun fact: You know the beginning of A Fistful of Dollars where the local gunslingers make fun of Clint Eastwood's donkey and Eastwood demands they apologize to the donkey? That's lifted from The Three Musketeers. Rochefort mocks D'Artagnan's old, brokedown farm horse and D'Artagnan is incensed.

A commenter asked which should be read first, The Hobbit of LOTR?
Easy, no question -- read The Hobbit first. It's actually the start of the story and comes first chronologically. It sets up some major characters and major pieces in play in LOTR.
Also, the Hobbit is Beginner-Friendly, which LOTR isn't. The Hobbit really is a delightful book, and a fast read. It's chatty, it's casual, it's exciting, and it's funny. In that dry cheeky British humor way. I love that the narrator is constantly making little asides and commentary, like he's just sitting next to you telling you this story as it occurs to him.
LOTR is a very long story. Fifteen hundred pages or so. The Hobbit is relatively short and very punchy and easy to read. If you don't like The Hobbit, you can skip out on LOTR. If you do like it, you'll be primed to read LOTR.
Oh, I should say: The Hobbit is written as if it's for children, but one of those smart children's stories that are also for adults. Don't worry, there's also real fighting and violence and horror in it, too.
LOTR is written for adults. (It's said that Tolkien wrote both for his children, but LOTR was written 17 years later, when his children were adults.) Some might not like The Hobbit due to its sometimes frivolous tone. Me, I love it. I find it constantly amusing. Both are really good but there is a starkly different tone to both. LOTR is epic, grand, and serious, about a world war, The Hobbit is light and breezy, and about a heist. Though a heist that culminates in a war for the spoils.

The Hobbit Challenge: Read two more chapters. I didn't have much time. Bilbo got the ring.
I noticed a continuity problem. Maybe. Now, as of the time of The Hobbit, it was unknown that this magic ring was in fact a Ring of Power, and it was doubly unknown that it was the Ring of Power, the Master Ring that controlled the others.
But the narrator -- who we will learn in LOTR was none of than Bilbo himself, who wrote the book as "There and Back Again" -- says this about Gollum's ring:
"But who knows how Gollum had come by that present [the Ring], ages ago in the old days when such rings were still at large in the world? Perhaps even the Master who ruled them could not have said."
In another passage, the ring is identified as a "ring of power."
I don't know, I always thought there was a distinction between mere magic rings and the Rings of Power created by Sauron. But this suggests that Bilbo knew this was a ring of power created by Sauron.
Now I don't remember when Bilbo wrote the Hobbit. In the movie, he shows Frodo the book in Rivendell, and I guess he wrote it after he left the Shire. I guess he might have added in the part about the ring being a ring of power created by "the Master" after Gandalf appraised him of his research into the ring.
I never noticed this before. I know Tolkien re-wrote this chapter while he was writing LOTR to make the ring important from the start. And also to make Gollum more sinister and evil, and also to remove the part where Gollum actually offers Bilbo the ring as a "present" -- Bilbo had already found it on his own, but Gollum was wiling to give it away, which obviously is not something the rewritten Gollum would ever do.
But I had no memory of the ring being suggested to be The Ring so early in the tale.

Finish the job, Mr. President!
Melanie Phillips lays out the case for the total destruction of the Iranian government and armed forces. [CBD]

TJM acts like he knows anything about John Wick and screenwriting. It's embarrassing, really.

Podcast: Sefton and CBD talk about how would a peace treaty with Iran work, Democrats defending murderers and rapists, The GOP vs. Dem bench for 2028, composting bodies? And more!

Oh, I forgot to mention this quote from Pete Hegseth, reported by Roger Kimball: "We are sharing the ocean with the Iranian Navy. We're giving them the bottom half."

Batman fires The Batman
Batman is disgusted by the Joachim Phoenix version of Joker
Batman tries to fire Superman
Batman is still workshopping his Bat-Voice

Forgotten 80s Mystery Click: Red Leather Suit and Sweatband Edition
And I was here to please
I'm even on knees
Makin' love to whoever I please
I gotta do it my way
Or no way at all

Tomorrow is March 25th, "Tolkien Reading Day," because March 25th is the day when the Ring is destroyed in the book. I think I'm going to start the Hobbit tomorrow and read all four books this time.
The only bad part of the trilogy are the Frodo/Sam chapters in The Two Towers. They're repetitive, slow, and mostly about the weather and terrain. But most everything else is good. Weirdly, the Frodo-Sam chapters in Return of the King are exciting and action-packed and among the best in the trilogy. (Though the chapters with everyone else in Return of the King get pretty slow again. Mostly people talking about marching towards war, and then marching towards war.)

Sec. Army recognizes ODU Army ROTC cadets for their bravery and sacrifice in private ceremony
[Hat Tip: Diogenes] [CBD]

TJM gives you a brief tour of his movie collection.

Forgotten 80s Mystery Click
One day I'm gonna write a poem in a letter
One day I'm gonna get that faculty together
Remember that everybody has to wait in line
Oh, [Song Title], look out world, oh, you know I've got mine

US decimation of Iran's ICBM forces is due to Space Force's instant detection of launches -- and the launchers' hiding places -- and rapid counter-attack via missiles
AI is doing a lot of the work in analyzing images to find the exact hiding place of the launchers. Counter-strikes are now coming in four hours after a launch, whereas previously it might have taken days for humans to go over the imagery and data.

Robert Mueller, Former Special Counsel Who Probed Trump, Dies

“robert mueller just died,” trump wrote in a truth social post on march 21. “good, i’m glad he’s dead. he can no longer hurt innocent people! president donald j. trump.”

TJM has thoughts on Superheros and Iconography

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Podcast: Sefton and CBD have a short chat about Iran, the disgusting SAVE Act theater, Mamdani's politicizing of St. Patrick's Day, and more!