Sometimes I like to read Jon Udell's weblog. He's a smart guy with good ideas, and comes up with eloquent ways of expressing them. When I find things that I like, especially on weblogs, I like to link to them. But, oddly, Patrick Kenealy, the CEO of IDG, which publishes InfoWorld, is trying to ban links to their articles.
Now I don't know Patrick, but I do know that they're paying lots of people to update weblogs, check facts, edit stories, and publish articles on IDG sites. And I know that I usually find those articles and read their associated ads through links from other sites.
Patrick, it's well within your rights to ask people not to link to your stuff, or to do so conditionally. But it reflects a grave misunderstanding of the market you're in. Learn from iTunes, not from the RIAA. Ask your writers and your advertisers what they'd prefer. I bet they're not looking to be walled off from the web.
"Patrick Kenealy, the CEO of IDG, which publishes InfoWorld, is trying to ban links to their articles."
Hi Anil, are you sure about that conclusion? The ContentBiz article you cited merely states that they're redirecting visitors from TechTarget with a special message, in response to perceived abusive linking. This seems quite different from "banning [all]linking"... in previous deep-linking debates the tactic of checking the referring link has seemed to be the universally favored one. Do you see another article somewhere which actually states that IDG is attempting to ban incoming links in general...?
tx,
jd
Does seem like JD has the truth of it -- this was an IDG reaction to a competitor bypassing IDGs own login screens and profiting from IDG's material. Seems as if IDG is being particularly careful with whom they're blocking.
Doesn't strike me that it impacts on just plains folks like us.
I dunno, JD, I read this:
And it looks to me like he wants Shelley's email address if I link to him. Am I misreading somnething?
Was it your intention to exclude the actual HREFs from those links to illustrate your point? At first I thought it was just a coding error but now I realize I might just be a bit slow on the uptake.
Shh, Simon, you'll let everyone in on my cleverness!
I know how to get to the bottom of this... I'm gonna link to one of their articles right now, and if I disappear in a burst of flame and you never hear from me again then you'll know *exactly* what happened to me.... ;-)
I dunno, Anil. Are you charging for me?
So, basically, IDG realized that linking to their articles allowed readers to bypass registration, and they're blaming TechTarget for their own lousy web design.
Everything will just sort itself out once they figure how the NYTimes transforms deep linking into self promotion, right?