NO HOTLINKING!!!

Please…. i repeat… please DO NOT HOTLINK OUR IMAGES. We have mentioned this more than a few times in each of our post and it’s getting frustrating how people are ignoring our message. Hotlinking is a complete bandwidth theft…

Tumblr users, we know that the facility to reblog is what “defines” tumblr.. but we kindly ask you NOT to reblog any of our future posts that include pictures / images as it might be of a relation to hotlinking, UNLESS you either re-upload the pictures or simply remove them. You don’t have to remove all of your posts – which contain images – that were previously reblogged from us.. as it’s too much for us to ask. Should we say, reblogging is not actually a crime since it was made for the sake of sharing.

“Bandwidth theft or “hotlinking” is direct linking to a web site’s files (images, video, etc.). An example would be using an 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 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. ” ~atlab.com

If you want to distribute our images / articles elsewhere, say your own blogs or other forums, the only thing you have to do is to save the pictures to your computer and upload them into your own server’s directory OR any free image hosting services like PHOTOBUCKET and IMAGESHACK. This is probably a pain in the ass or unpractical for some of you but failing to do so will cost us more. Please try to put yourself in our shoes.. it ain’t pretty. We exceeded our monthly bandwidth limit in photobucket… and the result that came from it? OUR IMAGES WERE TAKEN DOWN.. all of them that were hosted by PB. We had to upgrade to a PRO account for you to be able to see the pictures posted in our site.

We are still a new kid in the block, so having to take out $4 from our wallet isn’t something we’d willingly do. We are not pointing our fingers at all of our readers, but this is merely a warning for those who aren’t familiar with the concept of hotlinking.

We are only asking for a small favor here so don’t make this even harder for us. TwELFs was made for us to share our interests and have some fun. So are we cool?? ^^