giving credit where credit is due

August 28, 2004 6:04 PM

What's the etiquette for VIA if you're emailed a link by a blogger, but that link's not actually on their blog? Should one just not provide a VIA or should you link to the blog anyway to give credit where it's due?
posted by dobbs to etiquette/policy at 6:04 PM (20 comments total)

how about (thanks steve-o!)

Or, you could just email him back and say "thanks, I posted it" and paste in the mefi URL.
posted by mathowie at 6:19 PM on August 28, 2004

VIA?
posted by Quartermass at 7:01 PM on August 28, 2004

He just means via, but I too thought it was an acronym for something.

I've seen people here credit people at #mefi by just mentioning their names. Jeffrey Zeldman used to give 'hat tips' to people who emailed him links - I always liked that.
posted by iconomy at 7:11 PM on August 28, 2004

V.I.A.: Virtual Internet Asshattery
posted by wendell at 7:30 PM on August 28, 2004

veritas in artibus
posted by PrinceValium at 7:30 PM on August 28, 2004

I never use via links. Nor do I ever click them. What's the point of them, again? Whoever I'd be giving "credit" to probably nicked it from somewhere else anyway.
posted by reklaw at 7:40 PM on August 28, 2004

If I click on a via link it's not to see the same link posted there, it's to see the other stuff that's there. So I don't think it's a big deal.

And posting a via is how we keep this whole 'internet community' thing going. I could just find some obscure blog and steal links from there to get lots of new fpps, but it would be better to just post a 'via'.
posted by Space Coyote at 7:54 PM on August 28, 2004

VIAs are meaningless to me; I never click them and probably never will.
posted by mischief at 8:12 PM on August 28, 2004

I get it. D'oh!
posted by Quartermass at 8:41 PM on August 28, 2004

Get.... the latest service pack?
posted by Keyser Soze at 9:40 PM on August 28, 2004

I clicked a via. Once.
posted by strangeleftydoublethink at 9:49 PM on August 28, 2004

i shot a via today.
posted by eastlakestandard at 10:05 PM on August 28, 2004

This "via" -- it "via-brates?"
posted by davidmsc at 4:32 AM on August 29, 2004

I generally say "via blog" if the materials from the blog and "via Joe Bleau of blog" if Joe sent it to me.

reklaw and mischief confirm their positioning in my mental MeFi Zoo. "Politeness is bourgeois foolishness! Let us take and not give, for that is nature's way!" Ah well, it takes all kinds.
posted by languagehat at 7:33 AM on August 29, 2004

thx.
posted by dobbs at 7:45 AM on August 29, 2004

"Politeness is bourgeois foolishness! Let us take and not give, for that is nature's way!"

Hmm, is that my objectivist background or my animalism?
posted by mischief at 10:58 AM on August 29, 2004

If I click on a via link it's not to see the same link posted there, it's to see the other stuff that's there.

Me too. I've found some great new sites VIA the VIA.

Who was it who said something like "We can't just go around linking willy-nilly to websites whenever we feel like it" ? Someone said it just last week or so, here at metatalk, I think, and I meant to save the comment because I got such a kick out of it. Now when I google for it I can't find it.
posted by iconomy at 1:27 PM on August 29, 2004

Ico: keswick.
posted by taz at 1:51 PM on August 29, 2004

Ah, thanks, taz! That one's a keeper. Now why couldn't I find that myself? Grrr.
posted by iconomy at 1:55 PM on August 29, 2004

I think google hadn't cached that page yet, maybe. I found it on the internal search (for once).

I wanted to mention also that if I have time for a leisurely stroll though the blue, I usually click (and appreciate) the "via"s.
posted by taz at 3:37 PM on August 29, 2004