i'm still waiting for malware to propagate by a shortened url that goes to a legitimate site, builds up credibility (retweeted, etc.) and then is swapped out on the shortening site to start redirecting to a different page that looks like the original but does some drive-by download or exploits a zero-day vulnerability.
there would be hundreds of inbound links pointing to it coming from trusted sources, and could even use a legitimate shortener like bit.ly but just make the bit.ly link direct to some other shortener that nobody would notice (because the browser redirection would happen so quickly), then do the switch at that second shortener.
The previous HN story is "Korea's Internet Is Mired in a Microsoft Monoculture (chosun.com)" so I did a URL shortener substituting [company] for "Korea." The only problem was that I could not selectively substitute for both "Korea" and "Korean" (I tried ordering them, didn't help), so Korean became [company]n.
Mug.gd doesn't say how long the shortened url lasts, so I hope my gentle readers click the link before it rots. :-/
I'll second that. The whole point of the internet (at least as I see it) of linking relevant documents together is pretty much lost when those links are fragile shortened urls. Maybe if there was a markup, similar to the img alt tag, that allowed you to say "Here's the short one, if that doesn't work, here's the full one".
The real issue, as I see it, is that people solved the wrong problem. I see this a lot at my new job, where they created bigger problems for themselves by asking the wrong questions and therefor solving the wrong problem. Isn't the main reason people use shortened URLs so that they can link to things on sites like Twitter where every character counts? If that is the case then the real problem isn't that URLs are too long, it's that Twitter counts them against you, instead of allowing people to put actual hyperlinks (you know, <a href="xyz">Title</a>) in their tweets. If the only part that counted against your character count was the Title section then we wouldn't have this problem. They could even simplify the markup somehow to make it more user friendly then actual HTML.
If I've misunderstood the problem that URL shorteners are trying to solve then I apologize for my off the mark rant.
Wait, you're telling me that "the best new protocol" and "the future of the internet" is being held back by the telcos, the most hated, slow moving, bureaucratic companies on earth?
The real reason why people use URL shorteners is because they can instantly track how many people have clicked on their link.
For PR2.0 whores, it's addictive.
Twitter's 140 character limit was just the original excuse. Now everyone who is selling stuff loves the ability to track every click and see how their propagate over the "social graph". If they could, they'd force you to install a Firefox plug-in so they know what you are looking at and why you didn't click on their link...
The linker can inspect a direct link to see where it was pointing, in order to find it on archive.org or to contact the linkee and notify them the link went down. If a shortener goes down, the linker only has the obfuscated url, and has to rely only on their memory to redirect the link.
Trust is a powerful thing. You can get a lot more done when you have trust. It would be a shame to break that trust for no real reason other than it seemed like a clever idea at the time.
I noticed that one URL shortener is engaging in massive Cookie Dropping, as soon as you click on a link you add 50 affiliate cookies ... nice business modell, not so nice service
I have always been hesitant on clicking shortened URLs. I have trust issues. It's almost like a box of chocolate, you never know what you're going to get!
Meh. There are plenty of open redirects out there anyway, and using one you made yourself has the disadvantage that you'll be visible in the Referrer logs.
I was going for obvious. There is (currently) a way around that. I say currently because I have updates to fix it.
I know this would be a "fun tool" for some people to play jokes and pranks on other people, but cannot in good conscious let that happen without /some/ level of indication.
there would be hundreds of inbound links pointing to it coming from trusted sources, and could even use a legitimate shortener like bit.ly but just make the bit.ly link direct to some other shortener that nobody would notice (because the browser redirection would happen so quickly), then do the switch at that second shortener.