Trackback Courtesy

Dear fellow bloggers,

I just wanted to give a quick word on trackback courtesy.  Trackbacks are a wonderful blogging tool.  If you are commenting on something someone else said in a post on their blog you can send them a trackback to let them know you are talking about them.  This is a courtesy to the one you are talking about and it gives them the opportunity to go to your blog to see what you are saying about them.  That way they can interact with you and can keep the conversation going.

But in the spirit of courtesy, if you are going to trackback to someone please do talk about them in your post.  A couple of weeks ago LaShawn mentioned that she was not accepting trackbacks from people who don't talk about her post in their posts.  I actually thought it a bit odd that she would have to say that.  After all, I just assumed that everyone who trackbacked to another blog had a link to that post on their own blog.  But in the last couple of weeks I have received trackbacks on posts where the other blogger doesn't even mention anything I have written.  True, they are usually commenting on the same subject, but they don't mention my post.

What this means is that these people are putting a link to themselves on my blog but not putting a link to me on their blog.  This smacks of link-whoring, where you are just trying to get more links to your blog on other blogs. If you trackback to a post of mine I assume it is because you are interacting with something I have written.  If you aren't interacting with me, then why are you trackbacking to me, unless it is simply to build your own stats.  And though I am not aware of where I have done this before, if I have done it to you please let me know so I can make amends.

I don't begrudge anyone who wants to get more links to their blogs.  I like links and am happy to provide open trackbacks where others can draw attention to their own blogs through mine.  But, remember that trackbacks are a simple courtesy and courtesy suggests that if you are going to put a link to your blog on mine, you should at least mention me, via a link, in the post from which you trackbacked.  It doesn't have to be much - a simple "Jollyblogger is also talking about this subject" is sufficient.   Thanks for your time in reading this.

Courteously yours,
The Jollyman