Non-Libyan URL Shortener

While it is a funny play on all those .ly domains and the fact that vb.ly got seized by the Libyan government, it is my opinion that yet another URL shortener is a stupid way of protest.<p>Let me explain: I work with the Urlteam, a group of people that saves shorturl-&#62;longurl mappings for a bunch of shorteners. The typical life cycle of small shorteners is this:<p>- URL shortener opens, gets some praise for weird feature that bit.ly doesn't have.<p>- People actually don't care about feature and continue to use bit.ly.<p>- Spammers discover the shortener and abuse it.<p>- Owner closes the shortener because he can't deal with the spam.<p>All that remains are some non-functional links.

You should block me from redirecting a link to itself.<p><a href="http://gadaf.fi/5j" rel="nofollow">http://gadaf.fi/5j</a><p>And probably block cycles too.

Or just use j.mp, it's the same as bit.ly just without the dependence on the Libya TLD.

Both funny and poignant. It is interesting to consider how many popular web services use .ly domain names and are hence tied to Libya (albeit far removed).

I tip my hat to the genius who came up with this.

One minor problem being that it takes the "short" out of "URL shortener."<p>Decent for making a point, but those characters are a precious commodity on Twitter.

Slightly unrelated, but given the current sanctions, you can't renew a .ly domain name right now as a US business, correct? Bit.ly's domain name expires early next year, last time I checked.

Why not host your own?<p>I've been using Yourls (<a href="http://yourls.org/" rel="nofollow">http://yourls.org/</a>) for a while now. It works very well. I bought a short domain, installed Yourls in under 5 min and have been happily using it ever since. It even works with Tweetdeck to auto shorten URL's and has a couple of bookmarklets to make things easy. It's locked down for private / non-spammer use and is under my full control.

I know this is kind of a joke, kind of a way to bring publicity to whats happening in Lybia, but if the bit.ly domain disappears you can always just rewrite "bit.ly" to "j.mp" and the short URLs will keep working.<p>Then again, this presumes that the <i>company</i> is still running (which we can't really put a ton of faith in), which is why i use <a href="http://isshort.com" rel="nofollow">http://isshort.com</a> (shameless plug) to find publisher-provided short URLs where possible.

Hate to nit pick but isn't it Gaddafi, or Qaddafi?<p>Edit: So it is, although the correct spelling is already taken.

I was simultaneously impressed by the clean, informative presentation and horrified by the assault of grammatical errors.<p>May I suggest having a native english-speaker review your copy? Otherwise nice site.

I think it should add <a href="http://" rel="nofollow">http://</a> if it's missing.. I wasn't sure what wasn't working at first when trying www.google.com.<p>Also, I find gadaf.fi really hard to remember.

I tried 5 different URLS, then I realized that it only works if you include http or https.

While it's a great pun, it's not exactly short, though is it?

Dictators don't just come out with their own line of cars anymore. <a href="http://goo.gl/PqQTK" rel="nofollow">http://goo.gl/PqQTK</a>

Cool idea! Best URL shortener name of the year.

Now, if only we could stop getting our tv from Tuvalu. Stop reliance on foreign domains! America needs Internet independence!<p>/palin rhetoric

First post!

I don't consider this a nice move. I actually hate it. It's like Gaddafi is going to stand longer than that and that we should only boycott him. We ought better supporting the rebellion or the people who are under the fire.<p>-- Misrata (24 April): <a href="http://www.facebook.com/media/set/fbx/?set=a.10150168031801915.297670.349930726914" rel="nofollow">http://www.facebook.com/media/set/fbx/?set=a.101501680318019...</a>