There is something labeled very clearly as a "Direct Link." When I paste that link into my browser, I go to the image file.
If people are posting the Direct Link and it is indeed redirecting to the full site (per the claims), then that is most certainly a very dark pattern if not an outright example of blatantly lying to their users.
So in this case it is very much about the UI and what is presented to the user at the time they are grabbing the URL.
I tried to explain above of why that does not feel right to mix it in as dark pattern, but it gets muddy and based on the votes people don't seem to understand it, or just don't find it convincing. Short, adjusted for here: I'm not convinced people would not share and click those links anyway even if it were correctly labeled. But the widget looking like this is a good point against that argumentation of mine.
> if not an outright example of blatantly lying to their users.
That of course. Hotlink protection for an image hoster when even providing official direct link is in any case a deception, maybe a lie. Please don't mistake my argumentation against the use of the dark pattern term as a defense of the behavior.
There is something labeled very clearly as a "Direct Link." When I paste that link into my browser, I go to the image file.
If people are posting the Direct Link and it is indeed redirecting to the full site (per the claims), then that is most certainly a very dark pattern if not an outright example of blatantly lying to their users.
So in this case it is very much about the UI and what is presented to the user at the time they are grabbing the URL.