Comments on: Rush Limbaugh and Fox News too damned cheap to pay for their own bandwidth

By: Jeff Molby

Jeff Molby — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 00:21:12 +0000

Thanks, Brad! Very nice.

By: Eric

Eric — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 00:05:04 +0000

Very cool!

By: Brad Warbiany

Brad Warbiany — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 23:30:29 +0000

Alright, folks… Per popular request, I did a simple redirect.

(Had I known I could do that, with some nice googling, I would have done it yesterday).

By: Brad Warbiany

Brad Warbiany — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 22:30:15 +0000

Well, because publicly shaming hotlinkers is internet tradition! I could have gone far worse with it (I’d considered the photo Stephen Gordon has used once or twice of a particularly large woman), but I tried to keep it factual and brief. Simply put, this is well-known netiquette that they violated, and frankly they deserve to be called out on it.

After another day or two, I’ll clean it up, because a number of little web sites (who probably can’t host their own documents) have linked the PDF, and I’ll put up a redirect.

By: Eric

Eric — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 22:23:47 +0000

I say get the good karma and take the opportunity. I will happily chip in some money, if needed. Take the high road! That’s my advice.

By: Jeff Molby

Jeff Molby — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 21:58:42 +0000

But why publicly shame Rush (and formerly, Fox)? As bad as the GOP has been, there are still a fair number of truly liberty-minded people over there. Yeah, it was bad form to post the link that they did, but the bottom line is that this is a rare opportunity to speak to a large number of potential new readers.

Considering how pissed off the foot soldiers of the GOP are, it’s an rare opportunity to speak for our movement. I hope you decide to put your best foot forward. If it’s purely a matter of bandwidth, I’d be happy to share the burden. I’m sure there are many others out there that will as well.

By: Brad Warbiany

Brad Warbiany — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 21:47:09 +0000

Yes… I updated that PDF so it now contains a link to the original post.

By: Jeff Molby

Jeff Molby — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 21:45:07 +0000

Essentially, Jeff, they weren’t linking to our *site*. They were linking to our web host and our wallets. We’re running a blog here, not an FTP service.

Right, I understand that. Re-read my posts. I'm saying you should redirect them to your site. You can't change the link on their site, but you can mitigate the problem by redirecting users to the page that they should have linked to. That way you get what you want (a fair chance to acquire new readers) and they still get what they want (acquiring the desired content via a pleasant experience).

By: Brad Warbiany

Brad Warbiany — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 21:39:52 +0000

Doug,

That’s correct, it doesn’t even show up as a sitemeter hit (since the PDF has no code to alert sitemeter).

Essentially, Jeff, they weren’t linking to our *site*. They were linking to our web host and our wallets. We’re running a blog here, not an FTP service.

Michelle Malkin was kind enough to link to The Liberty Papers and Stephen’s original blog post. That’s what people who actually understand this whole “new-fangled media” do (and hence why Stephen thanked her for it).

By: Talent On Loan From God. Bandwidth Taken By Theft. | Popehat

Talent On Loan From God. Bandwidth Taken By Theft. | Popehat — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 21:31:00 +0000

[...] Rush Limbaugh is a hotlinker. [...]

By: Jeff Molby

Jeff Molby — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 21:30:45 +0000

Or even better… Since you know that most of the new people seeking that report are Republicans, you should create a new post that gives them what they want, but also pitches the philosophy of freedom to them. Most will just hit and run, but there are probably some open minded people out there that could become regular readers.

If you don’t have time to write something up, I’d at least embed this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8z1buym2xUM

By: Eric

Eric — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 21:26:48 +0000

I would also give a short explanation in the PDF of why it’s a bad link. Still, I think the redirect is the best idea Jeff. That way you get all your good karma traffic without having the bad karma of appearing to be petulant. I always figure that I will just let the other guy look bad and not doing something cause I’m angry that ends up with me looking bad too. To non internet geeks, this looks bad.

By: Doug Mataconis

Doug Mataconis — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 21:26:36 +0000

Jeff,

But the thing is there not really driving traffic to the site when they hotlink like this.

Brad will correct me if I’m wrong, but hotlinking doesn’t even show up as a hit to the blog, certainly not on Sitemeter, just a use of resources that, as the post says, costs money.

And it’s sort of a tradition to punk the guy who hotlinks you without permission

By: Brad Warbiany

Brad Warbiany — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 21:26:18 +0000

I’ve modified the PDF to point out that Fox has changed the link, and included a link to the original blog post.

Looks like Rush’s link is now onto yesterday’s show postings site, but it’s still hotlinking the original file.

By: Jeff Molby

Jeff Molby — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 21:20:18 +0000

Or at least serve up a pdf that says “Fox & Co gave you a bad link. Click here to go to find the DHS report.”

And of course your link would take them to the original post.