This is a two-part update.
Most important is our first order of business: forwardslash has joined the Hubski team!
forwardslash created a Hubski account 583 days ago, and he has been an asset to the site ever since. Not only has he been a great contributor, he has personally created Hubski plugins, and helped to build the Hubski Enhancement Suite. In short, forwardslash ‘gets’ Hubski, and it is awesome to be able to bring on a member of the community.
(Feel free to gloss over the next paragraph if you aren’t interested in odd file-sharing protocols.)
Some time ago, minimum_wage asked whether or not we could allow magnet links to embed properly. Magnet links typically contain information for files downloadable from P2P networks. In short, they are normally used for torrents. In fact, magnet links will not function unless you have software that employs them. The decision to include magnet links is one that we have not completely settled upon. However, as a magnet can simply be expressed in plain text, we decided to make them functional.
Here is a sample magnet link.
It’s something we will be watching, and we’ll be happy to discuss this below. forwardslash enabled magnet links as his first update to Hubski. Thanks, forwardslash!
And as always, feedback is much appreciated!
Welcome aboard, forwardslash!
I actually think this is huge. It's a total 'geek' feature that could potentially drive traffic. I think those are, hands down, the best kind and can be sleeper hits for generating value and engagement for the site. Or it could do nothing at all, haha. As you said, the nature of the traffic it could generate needs to be watched and probably tweaked, but possibly one of the better updates, even though I think it will have very limited adoption for possibly a while.
I am very familiar with magnet links. What is going to be shared on hubski? Congrats to forwardslash and his deserved inclusion in the team!
That remains to be seen. We don't have any interest in becoming a file-sharing search engine, particularly for copyrighted content, but it's possible they could be used for other purposes. It really depends on the nature of the files. What makes a file-sharing site viable is not only the links, but a useful search mechanism. It's possible that we will exclude magnet links from search if people started to use it in this fashion. As it stands, people can always share magnet links as plain text: magnet:?xt=urn:sha1:YNCKHTQCWBTRNJIV4WNAE52SJUQCZO5C so making them clickable doesn't seem too earth-shattering.I am very familiar with magnet links. What is going to be shared on hubski?
That's a great question, that I'll let mk answer as I'm not that familiar with magnet links. I don't think we specifically have an answer though but are simply enabling the option. We are curious to see how/if they're used. But, I do want to give a big, formal WELCOME to forwardslash! We are lucky to have him on board. Already, he's had some really great ideas and input for the site. Recently, insomniasexx posted getting started a call for a Hubski tutorial and FS has made some nice strides there. We are in a good place and have a strong team. Any suggestions for the site have always been encouraged, but now more than ever, if they are adopted, they'll be more quickly actioned.