GB's policy on links to other bloggers

For ages, I've had a list of links to other bloggers who link to me at the bottom of the side bar on the right hand side of this blog. I maintain the list manually. I reckon that if another blogger is kind enough to link to me, then I'm happy to repay the compliment :-).

However, as I've learned more about blogging, links and the internet, I've discovered that some links aren't as good as others. The best links are (1) from the main page of a blog, and also (2) embedded directly in the page using html and not via a link manager like blogrolling.com which actually only puts a bit of javascript on the main page. It's also important that (3) the link is to one's main page, which is http://gaybanker.blogspot.com/ in my case.

Anyone who links to me gets a good link in return. The side bar is part of the main blog page, and the links are embedded directly into the side bar with html. So in future, I'm only going to reciprocate a link if it's a good link which follows this policy. As and when I get time, I'll be trawling through my existing links to weed out the links which don't follow the policy.

If any other bloggers visit me regularly and don't yet have a link to me, now would be a good time to put one in. I'll repay the compliment for a good link :-). For people who use blogger.com, the "link list" Page Element on the layout screen does create what I'm calling a good link.

Lastly, one can always create a good link manually using html. And for people who have trouble with html, the html to link to me is:

<a href="http://gaybanker.blogspot.com/" title="A blog about all aspects of being a gay guy in 21st Century London">Gay Banker</a><br/>

or

<a href="http://gaybanker.blogspot.com/" target="_blank" title="A blog about all aspects of being a gay guy in 21st Century London">Gay Banker</a><br/>

if you want the link to open in a new window :-).

Update 5-Sep-08: I've had a couple of comments by email complaining that some of the blogs that I link to don't get updated any more. So please be aware, I'll delete links to blogs which haven't been updated for more than three months. Lastly, I'll also exclude links to blogs which are only open to invited readers.