Retiring the Links page

My website header from 1999

Program note: I had to retire a long-time feature of my website, the Links page.

I started this website back in 1996. (You can see a copy of my site from 1999.) Before Google and search engine optimization, we promoted websites by exchanging links. Today, I get most of my visits from searches and social media. Although Links pages have gone the way of the VHS tape, I kept mine to promote sites I found useful and interesting.

In recent months, I received a lot of requests to add links to sites that are not related to public speaking, writing, and other subjects covered on this site. I accommodated those requests for a while, but the list of unrelated sites was becoming larger than those related to this site. I also had to take time to review these links and found I was being asked to promote commercial sites for free. I asked that people only send links to related sites, but I was still getting requests to link to unrelated sites.

So, I decided to retire the Links page. I can use the time I’ve been spending on maintaining the page and dealing with requests to provide you with more content. Thank you for your understanding and for supporting this site.