Long URL’s, oh what a pain. For example, can you imagine the phone conversation trying to someone how to get to Pooh Bridge
http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=51.088591,0.101967&spn=0.039539,0.079501&t=h&hl=en or worse still, if I emailed that Google map URL to someone the thing is so long that many email clients will break that URL into two distinct lines of text. I mean look at what it does to the blog. Not real pretty :-(.
TinyURL solves this problem by automatically squishing any long URL into a permanent, smaller URL that you can easily share with others and the whole process is just so simple:
- Copy any long URL [just highlight the URL in your web browser, right-click, and then choose “Copy.”]
- Point your web browser to http://tinyurl.com/
- Paste [Right-click > Paste] that long URL into the box on the TinyURL web site.
- Click on the “Make TinyURL” button.
- Copy the resulting shortened URL and share it with others.
For example, using TinyURL I can turn that really long Google Map URL for Pooh Bridge into something MUCH shorter: http://tinyurl.com/cawxw
If you are a fan of the “bookmarklet” (and I have to admit I’m not), TinyURL lets you add a TinyURL button to your browser that cuts the process downto one step: See “Add TinyURL to your browser’s toolbar.” on the site.
We all should probably try to use TinyURL more often.