Back in the early days of Twitter, also known as the ancient times of 2006, sharing links on Twitter was a huge problem. A link to a particularly insightful blog would look like this:
Having only 140 characters at your disposal, this means that posting that great link just took up over 100 of your available characters to tweet about it.
Soon, the micro-blogging service realized the issues and as a result, automatically started shortening long URLs to make its users save on space for their 140-character updates.
To accomplish this end, Twitter used TinyURL, ( www.tinyurl.com) a service that shortens URLs. How does this work?
Every long URL is associated with a key, which is the part after http://domain.tld/. For example http://tinyurl.com/m3q2xt has a key of m3q2xt. There are several techniques used to shorten names; keys can be generated numerically in base 36, which assumes 26 letters and 10 numbers.
The keys in order would be 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and then the alphabet a, to z. If uppercase and lowercase letters are accepted then the number should be in base 62 (26 + 26 + 10).
For example, http://www.metamend.com/blog/2009/12/01/metamend-replica-watch-and-discount-online-pharmacy-diploma-tm. is shortened to http://tinyurl.com/ydj99rk.
This however is not a new idea.
The first URL shortening service, as we know it today, was TinyURL, which was launched in 2002. The idea itself has been around since at least 2001. Since that time, around 100 other sites offer similar services.
Shortened URL services have made news recently; sites such as Tr.im which shut down August 10, 2009, cli.gs which got hacked and exposed millions of users, and bit.ly which was recently selected by Twitter to replace tinyURL.
Bit.ly is a newer competitor to TinyURL that launched by raising $2 million from several prominent angel investors. One of the bit.ly backers is Betaworks, the startup accelerator behind Twitter related companies such as Summize (acquired by Twitter in July 2008), and has Twitter investors and advisors Chris Sacca and Ron Conway on their team.
So other than Twitter, why use URL shortening?
The biggest reason is for aesthetics for marketing and memorization; the shorter the name, the more memorable when it comes to marketing.
Web developers use short URLs to avoid URL garbling. See here.
Web developers pass descriptive attributes in the URL to represent data hierarchies, command structures, transaction paths and session information. Obviously with posting, cutting and pasting, a short URL is going to keep things much cleaner and much more useable.
One of the less virtuous uses URL shortening is to manipulate site visitors. This type of URL redirection, has been used in re-directs, phishing, and even affiliate hiding.
To keep Twitter safe from these types of malicious use, bit.ly is teaming with three security firms to warn users when a shortened link looks like it leads to one of these less than legitimate uses.
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URL-shortening services are very popular with internet scammers and phishers to disguise the true destination of both phishing Web sites and those that host malicious software. Facebook and Twitter have been targeted heavily in recent times. These networks will suffer greatly if users are uncomfortable clicking links, shortened or otherwise.
Other URL shortening services like br.st have started filtering all shortened links through services like Google Safe Browsing in response to the recent wave of misuse. bit.ly is working with Sophos, Verisign and Websense to check 40 million shortened links daily for links to malware, spam and phishing Web sites.
To compare, here is a list of 68 of the top shortening services:
A2N http://a2n.eu/tech
Beam.to http://beam.to/hongkiat
B65 http://b65.us/28x
CanURL http://canurl.com/s0hui
Decent URL http://hongkiat.decenturl.com/tech
DigBig http://digbig.com/4wxab
Doiop http://doiop.com/l3a46l
Dwarfurl http://dwarfurl.com/9ca0c
EasyURL http://easyurl.net/55a7a
EzURL http://www.ezurl.eu/1
FhURL http://fhurl.com/b10024
Fly2 http://fhurl.com/b10024
Is.gd http://is.gd/eMM
X.se http://www.x.se/xskb
LiteURL http://www.liteurl.net/a9sh
lnk.in http://lnk.in/5z5f
Metamark http://xrl.us/bkd33
Minilien http://minilien.com/?nhSqU4SkQp
MooURL http://moourl.com/woot/?moo=f9cmd
MyURL http://myurl.in/sSBTd
NanoRef http://nanoref.com/hongkiat/AvF62w
Ne1 http://you.ne1.net
Not long http://hongkiat.notlong.com
Nutshell URLhttp://nutshellurl.com/1yb
Redirx http://redirx.com/?0jxn
RubyURL http://rubyurl.com/1CO1
Shim http://yourname.shim.net
Shorl http://shorl.com/gabrafihobidra
ShortenURL http://www.shortenurl.com/6thpj
Shorter link http://shorterlink.com/?ABC123
Shortlinks http://shortlinks.co.uk/kkx
ShortURL http://hongkiat.shorturl.com
Short URL http://url.lotpatrol.com/?x=892
Get Shorty http://get-shorty.com/shorty/hongkiat/
Shrinkr http://shrinkr.com/13
ShrinkURL http://shrinkurl.us/vDC
SHurl http://shurl.net/afw
SimURL http://simurl.com/wugses
Sitelutions http://ByInter.com/you
SnipURL http://snipurl.com/28bo6
ShredURL http://shredurl.com/4de
Smallr http://smallr.com/35m
StartURL http://starturl.com/gsukp
Tight URL http://tighturl.com/7vk
Tiny Link http://tinylink.com/?jqdZqSlzo4
TinyURL http://tinyurl.com/6
TraceURL http://traceurl.com/rdS?r=1507&l=15
Ulimit http://hongkiat.euro.st
URL.co.uk http://url.co.uk/f2ktz
URL Cutter http://urlcutter.com?39024
URLcut http://urlcut.com/1pxhz
URL Hawk http://urlhawk.com/5k9
URl.ie http://url.ie/dkx
Url Tea http://urltea.com/367u
U76 http://u76.org/o2
WapURL http://wapurl.co.uk/?CGL8HL3
Xil http://xil.in/2323/
YATUC http://yatuc.com/b$t
Yep It http://yep.it/l4_74e
6URL http://www.6URL.com/1P77
301URL http://301url.com/K
URL Pie http://www.urlpire.com/?QQATP
Pi URL http://piurl.com/5
URLvi http://urlvi.be/kzawc
Shrtnd http://shrtnd.com/444/
FwdURL http://fwdurl.net/258
G8L http://g8l.us/8uq
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