On Sat, 2005-03-05 at 16:16, Todd Walton wrote: > On Sat, 05 Mar 2005 12:14:17 -0500, RBW1 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > http://tinyurl.com/3kkma > > It's probably just me, but the use of tinyurl and ilk kinda bugs me. > The point is to make a > http://long.complicated.url?slkj23434lsl.asp?unnecessary=yes&morecrapjusttoconfuseyou=yes > shorter, right? Excellent motive, I say. The TinyURL service is > handy and, just as importantly, apparently reliable. But aren't there > any informal netiquette rules governing its use? > > I've seen people use it when the URL they were referring to was > completely within reason. It was as if they were just trying to hide > the real thing. TinyURL themselves actually condone this. From their > front page: > > "Hide your affiliate URLs > > "Are you posting something that you don't want people to know what the > URL is because it might give away that it's an affiliate link. Then > you can enter a URL into TinyURL, and your affiliate link will be > hidden from the visitor, only the tinyurl.com address and the ending > address will be visible to your visitors." > > ?dirty=yes > > The other beef I have with TinyURL use is the reliability of the > TinyURL service. They've been around since at least February of 2002. > That's three whole years. But what happens when, say, 20 years from > now they're gone? What if somebody else buys the domain name and > starts cashing in on all those dormant tinyurl hyperlinks out there? > What about the freaking page I wanted to link to?!?? > > Proposal: > > I think that when a TinyURL is employed, the real link should also be > included. Plain and simple. If the real, long URL gets mucked up, so > be it. But at least it's there, and a person can see where they're > being taken before they follow the link, as well as the actual > Internet address being referred to being available for posterity's > sake. > > This isn't a tirade against you, specifically, RBW. You just happened > to trigger a pre-existing peeve-mode. > > -todd
Hmmm... I hadn't really thought about it this way. Now I will. So far my motive is to shorten anything that is >@50 characters by a factor of >=4 solely as a courtesy to the recipient. As you point out there are other issues... RBW -- [email protected] http://www.kernel-panic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/kplug-list
