I notice you're hotlinking the images from their respective sources.
This isn't ideal from a privacy PoV, because you're basically announcing your presence to tens of different orgs even if you don't click on anything.
And, some hosts might not appreciate their images being hotlinked - the big sites probably don't care or even notice, but someone's personal blog without a media CDN might end up getting hammered with traffic.
No, using them without permission (potentially) violates copyright. Copyright does not concern itself with the specifics of the mechanism by which the rights-holder's content enters your user's web browser, so long as you're not circumventing DRM.
If you're posting content on HN, you should always expect a traffic increase anyways. And Cloudflare CDN is free anyways (unless you don't want to use it for political reasons, your choice)... Although I understand hotlinking is frowned-upon in a general context
This isn't ideal from a privacy PoV, because you're basically announcing your presence to tens of different orgs even if you don't click on anything.
And, some hosts might not appreciate their images being hotlinked - the big sites probably don't care or even notice, but someone's personal blog without a media CDN might end up getting hammered with traffic.