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URL shorteners set ad tracking cookies

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Re: URL shorteners set ad tracking cookies

#11

Post by Eriks »

stretchcat wrote: post #7
Eriks wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it's public and has been run for 11 years already and will continue to do so in foreseeable future. I would say it is the most popular one in my home country and it has good reputation among users. From my experience most linkrot issues comes from the fact that sites and documents URL shorteners link to go down before URL shorteners themselves. Many websites from 11 years ago doesn't exist anymore.

Will you die, will your heirs continue to operate this service? Or do consequences beyond your life not concern you? (e.g. "Why should I care about climate change, I'll be dead before it gets bad!" ) To mitigate the harm you've already caused, you should put the service into a read-only mode and contact Archive Team about handing off the database. You should do this today, before you get hit by a bus.

Thank you for being concerned for my life. I've set it up in a way that someone will take it over after my sudden death, don't worry.

And I care about climate change, even after my death.

Re: URL shorteners set ad tracking cookies

#12

Post by Eriks »

dejj wrote: post #8
Eriks wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it's public and has been run for 11 years already and will continue to do so in foreseeable future. I would say it is the most popular one in my home country and it has good reputation among users. From my experience most linkrot issues comes from the fact that sites and documents URL shorteners link to go down before URL shorteners themselves. Many websites from 11 years ago doesn't exist anymore.

Do you have some form of information escrow in place? E.g. could archive.org store a page of all your short-url mappings?

Not at the moment but Archive.org is an option I'm considering.

Re: URL shorteners set ad tracking cookies

#13

Post by bobkrusty »

rsync wrote: post #2

Although "Oh By"[1] is not strictly a URL shortener it can be used as one quite nicely. When used as a URL shortener, there are no cookies, no tracking, and ublock origin shows a nice big zero throughout. This is because the revenue model of Oh By is selling custom/vanity codes - not monetizing user data or advertising. "If you're looking for a dead-simple URL shortener that respects your privacy and doesn't slow you…

. You have to type http:// on the message field To make a redirect

Re: URL shorteners set ad tracking cookies

#14

Post by qwerty456127 »

stretchcat wrote: post #4
Eriks wrote: post #3

Not all URL shorteners do that. I know because I own and maintain one that doesn't.

Hopefully yours is only available on a company LAN or other private network. Public link shorteners are a linkrot disaster, particularly the myriad of shorteners being run by random dudes for shits and giggles, since those disappear as soon as they get bored. There is nothing more frustrating than having a dead shortened link for content that is likely still available if only you had the real URL, not the shortened g…

There are cases where URL shorteners are useful. E.g. some websites would parse a link you embed within a text you post and replace it with the actual video if that's a link to YouTube. A shortener may be the only way to post a classic hyperlink to a YouTube video there. Shortened URLs may also help when you need to put them on paper/merchandise or on TV or say them in a voice call. That's sad goo.gl has been discontinued - it was what you could rely on. IMHO archive.org should make their own.

Re: URL shorteners set ad tracking cookies

#17

Post by dang »

stretchcat wrote: post #7
Eriks wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it's public and has been run for 11 years already and will continue to do so in foreseeable future. I would say it is the most popular one in my home country and it has good reputation among users. From my experience most linkrot issues comes from the fact that sites and documents URL shorteners link to go down before URL shorteners themselves. Many websites from 11 years ago doesn't exist anymore.

Will you die, will your heirs continue to operate this service? Or do consequences beyond your life not concern you? (e.g. "Why should I care about climate change, I'll be dead before it gets bad!" ) To mitigate the harm you've already caused, you should put the service into a read-only mode and contact Archive Team about handing off the database. You should do this today, before you get hit by a bus.

Please don't post in the flamewar style to HN or cross into personal attack. Those things aren't compatible with curious conversation, which is what we're going for here. We're also trying to avoid the online callout/shaming culture [1].

Even if you're right, beating people with a stick will neither improve their behavior nor the quality of conversation for anybody else. The endgame of this is a ghost town inhabited by a few nasty diehards, abandoned by users one would actually want to have a conversation with. That seems to be the default fate of internet forums but the goal of this one has always been to stave it off a little longer [2].

[1] https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&type=comment&dateRange=a...

[2] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...

Re: URL shorteners set ad tracking cookies

#20

Post by ourcat »

CarelessExpert wrote: post #5

Eh, for links to content on my website I just cooked up my own URL shortener using Apache rewrite maps and a little scripting to generate the short codes. Simple, private, and entirely under my control (which also means I don't have to worry about the links breaking).

I did that for a while with a short domain I used to own (urlb.at). Then ended up regretting it and shutting it down.

I eventually decided that URL shorteners were a terrible idea for the web and that I wanted the 'actual' URLs out there.

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