The links effect

Links have started breeding on my blog.

A couple of days ago I got an nice email from Amazon inviting me to add a bit of HTML to the source code. I read it several times, I even looked at their demo page, and I still couldn't quite understand what it did. So I added it anyway out of curiosity.

Oh right, now I get it. Scroll down and look at the reading or read list at the bottom of the sidebar on the left. None of the links there are my own doing. Amazon cleverly scans my content for phrases it can identify with and makes its own links. Hover the cursor over one of them and a little preview window pops up. Neat. Note that it's not actually rewriting my own code to add these links - a quick check on View Page Source tells me that. Somehow these links are overlaid on top of what I've already written. If you follow through and actually buy the thing, I get a cut of your money. Apparently.

And they change. Yesterday, Vice Versa had a link to the 1988 movie of that title, but today it's gone. Maybe someone bought their last copy. This leads to the second unavoidable observation which is that they use guesswork. Amazon had no way of knowing that I was reading the 1880s original of a pompous father and wayward son accidentally swapping bodies, which is still very funny. Likewise the Good Shepherd link is to the Matt Damon movie of that name, not C.S. Forester's harrowing tale of the Atlantic convoys in WW2. Not seen the movie but I'm prepared to hazard a guess as to which is better.

If the pounds start rolling in, I may keep it; if not I'll drop it. Let's see.