I suggest that some kind of mod is installed which automatically finds the title of the page one is linking to (in PM's and posts) and makes it the anchor text for the link. Example: If I post this: http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=1112065 It should automatically become this: [Rules] Allowed or Not - [Quick Reference] IMO this will help users make more informed clicks, be good from SEO point of View and as jhmattern suggests, prevent users from becoming victims of phishing.
It would be nice (especially in that it would be easier to spot phishing links since that wouldn't apply to them), but as others have said, it would probably slow down a forum as big as DP. Shawn would have to confirm that though.
vBSEO use this in their software. Not sure if it can be done seperately or not. And no, it wouldn't really slow down the forum. Just a bit of php - when the post is made it'd fetch meta/title tags from the linked page.
But with vB4.0 coming out in the next month or so, I don't expect that Shawn is going to add too many mods/hacks until it's out.
It would slow down page load by no more than a few milliseconds, Vb performs numerous similar functions at every page load (like similar threads at the bottom)
Actually, this is not similar to that functionality. The plugin will have to go to the URL and fetch the page title. Anyway, I guess Shawn could do a test run and see how it goes. I'm sure his servers should be able to keep up..
Searching the database for similar thread is more tedious IMO. Anyways I am no expert, a novice probably
Well, this type of functionality only happens once, on the add or edit post. Once you see it here it's just plain text. It's just that, with alot of people adding / editing posts, it could slow down the server for the rest of us. Again, it seems to work quite well for other big forums, so perhaps it isn't such a big issue.
Would that not make it easier for people to hide their affiliate links? and and would that cause in increase in spam ?
It's more for the utility of readers than original posters Its always good to know beforehand what I am clicking on.
Hm I dont think that it is neccesary. I think it would seriously slow the server down because there were too many threads/replies at anytime.