Profit Baron

Personally I hate URL shorteners and it is not because they’re are so many of them…

2 Short.Url (2su.de), 2Zeus, 3.ly, 9mp, a.gd, abbr, arm.in, a.nf, bit.ly, bloat.me, Buk.me, BurnURL, Chilp.it, cli.gs, clk.my, Clop.in, DiggBar, ff.im, Fly2.ws, fon.gs, Foxy URL, FWD4.me, g4.ms, gl.am, Good.ly, Gurl.es, hex.io, Hurl.no, idek.net, irt.me, is.gd, J2j.de, kissa.be!, Kisa.Ch, kl.am, krz.ch, Kore.us, Kots.Nu, ktzros, Lincr, LinksPreadeR (l.pr), LinxFix, LNK.by, lt.tl, lurl.no, Metamark (xrl.us), migre.me, micURL, min2me, MinURL, Moourl, MyURL.in, nd url, Pendek.in, Pic.gd, PiURL, Plurl, pnt.me, POPrl, pt2.me, Puke.It, qr.cx, Qurl, qux.in, r.im, RDE.me, redir.ec, RIMS, rnk.me, RubyURL, Safe.mn, Sai.ly, SFU.ca, shorl, Short.ie, short.to, shortn.me, Shrtn, Shw.me, Smallr.net, SMFU, Snipie, SnipURL (sn.im), snkr.me, song.ly, srnk.net, StumbleUpon (su.pr), TightURL, TimesURL, tini.us, Tiny.cc, TinyURL, to.ly, to.vg, tr.im, tra.kz, tsort.us, tweet.me, Tweetburner (twurl.nl), Twip.us, Twirl.at, twtr.us (tw6.us), u.nu, UiopMe, ur.ly, URL.AG, URL.ie, URL (un)faker, urlBorg, urlShort (ooqx.com), urlShort (u.mavrev.com), urlzen, Virl, vl.am, VTC, XORTR (xrt.me), XR.com, xrl.in, X.vu, xxsurl.deZ.PE, Zi.pe, ZipMyURL, ZZ.GD

…and those are only the one’s which I have recently interacted with.

I hate the fact that I am forced to use them – with the main ones that I am forced to use being ff.im and bit.ly although ff.im links are only generated when sending FriendFeed data to Twitter so that doesn’t really bother me.

For example, if I go to Twitter and post a link it is automatically converted to a bit.ly link don’t get me wrong bit.ly is a really cool service especially the  “+” feature and the same happens when I click on a link from Twitter it is generally a bit.ly link (unless someone created it manually or used a service such as awe.sm like Techcrunch do) which means that we are basically adding an extra layer to the system.

However this isn’t the major problem with URL Shorteners.

Let me explain.

The Internet was designed in a way which meant that there wasn’t a single point of failure which could easily break large parts of the web. URL shorteners can cause this single point of failure because, a regular hyperlink implicates a browser, its DNS resolver and the publisher’s DNS server and website whilst a URL shortener adds an additional layer which acts like a third DNS resolver and if a problem occurs with the URL shortener then you can’t access the ‘real’ hyperlink which causes a single point of failure.

Additionally this extra layer means that it’s going to take time to get you to the link due to additional DNS lookups and server hits.

Expanding on this single point of failure theme, URL shorteners become middlemen sitting between the link and its original destination. This is one of my biggest concerns which I have previously expressed and which has been highlighted recently by the media with the fact that Tr.im decided it was going to close down although it has since decided to go “open-source” and remain open as the third-party could decide that a link which you shorten violates its Terms Of Service and delete it. Moreover, the URL shortener which is now the key to getting to the original link could experience downtime,  accidentally erase the database, forget to renew its domain, get hacked, disappear or change the way its url shortener works which means instead of sending you directly to the original link it sends you to a page on their site which contains the original link on.

Consequently, there is the usability aspect of using a URL Shortener which is highlighted on Twitter.com itself as you can’t tell where the link will take you (although you can tell on Twitter Search). However, FriendFeed does expand the url which helps to prevent phishing but many sites are like Twitter and do not expand the shortened URL.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 19th, 2009 at 5:31 AM and is filed under Internet. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.