@Andreas
agreed what you say, I kicked this discussion off only for one reason, because this ridiculous hit counting and even more by linking destroys the reason why I joined this site,,exactly the reasons you just gave,,show my pictures and it,s nice when sometimes some people comment and want more info or more info and even make contact now and then.
I would not have problems with that at all, but some members have seemingly only one goal to be on daily/weekly basis on top and that you can only achieve via linking, ridiculous in my opinion, but unfortunately an option which exists even here on this good site. Some members think, link to the outside here as hit counts has a informative and news value, beats me on that.
@ James
The site standard is good in my opinion, I saw some pictures what peoples wanted upload here,,I mean,,I would not unload them from my camera but delete them right then and there. A certain standard has to be maintained otherwise the overall standard, which made this site so successful declines rapidly. I sail as Master as you may know and Andreas does too for example and a few others as CaptainPeter, and very often I meet pilots for example who know this site and all of them mention one thing : he high standard and quality of the pictures.
I would hate that this would detoriate the site and quality means for me also when I do not see every day,,same posters,,same style ships over and over again.
@ Peter
good for me too !!! :-)