Holding Links for Ransom

Back in the old days of Internet, used to be that you would write to someone whose site you admire and ask them to consider linking to your site. You would have already posted a link to that other site on yours because you were showing them that you admired and respected their work; you would like to think the feeling could be mutual. If it was, great, if not – eh, no big deal.

So why is it I get so many requests from people asking us to list them on NewPages, and when I visit their site – no link to NewPages? I do see links to other sites, but none to ours. Has there been a shift in polite protocol for link requests? Are links now held for ransom, or more a tit for tat procedure – IF you link to me, THEN I’ll link to you – ?

I know that’s not how we do it at NewPages. If we discover a site that we like and don’t have listed – well, by golly, we list it, then we let the person know we’ve listed it. We don’t hold the link for “exchange ransom.” If we’re linked back – that’s great – but we must still be of the totally old school that just likes to link and let folks know we appreciate what they do. Not only that, but we continue to check our links on a regular basis, since often times sites change or disappear or discontinue without letting their link pals know. So we manage and maintain all of these links ourselves. We do it because we know our readers depend on us for this. Decent links to decent sites.

So, how ’bout it – can we bring back this decency somehow in link requests?