question on the board rules

[curious_1]

Hello, I was reading the rules since Im new here and I have a quick question on the part about hotlinking and bandwidth theft

I've never heard of this before, is the "bandwidth theft" concept just that I'm posting content, but using up thier bandwidth since the pic is actually on their site vs uploading the pic form this site or my own?

and how is a regular link any different? if anything I think it'd be worse becuase you'd have to navigate your way to what you want which should take up more bandwidth.

 

[Ax3C]

Simple definition for "hot-linking":

Bandwidth theft or "hot-linking" is direct linking to a web site'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, eBay auction listing, weblog, forum message post, etc.

Bandwidth refers to the amount of data transferred from a web site to a user's computer. When you view a web page, you are using that site's bandwidth to display the files. Since web hosts charge based on the amount of data transferred, bandwidth is an issue. If a site is over its monthly bandwidth, it's billed for the extra data or taken off-line.

A simple analogy for bandwidth theft: Imagine a random stranger plugging into your electrical outlets, using your electricity without your consent, and you are paying for not only your own personal use ... but their theft of your electricity as well.

When you create an account with any image hosting service (i.e., Photobucket, ImageShack, etc.) you are agreeing to their terms and conditions. Provided you agree, they assign a URL and HTML <IMG> tags to the image so that you may use said features rather than stealing someone else's already paid for band-width.

:hatsoff: