Tr.im URL Shortening Service Axed
The popular URL shortening service Tr.im announced yesterday that they would no longer be accepting new URLs, and would be discontnuing existing URL redirects at the end of this year. URL shortening services, such as Tr.im, are especially popular among Twitter users, in an effort to cut back on the length of their posts. I’ve been using Tr.im for the past two weeks, but have recently switched to Bit.ly. Services like Tr.im are extremely difficult to monitize, so it’s likely that we’ll see more services fold in the future. Choosing to provide shortened links to Twitter followers is risky, as the links will be live only as long as their service provider is able to afford to stay active. In the meantime, I suggest using Bit.ly if you need to use a URL shortening service with Twitter.
Zach, why Bit.ly as opposed to other shortening services? What are its advantages? Thanks.
Good question… there are quite a few to choose from, but Bit.ly does have several advantages: The host URL is shorter than others, like tinyurl.com (5 characters vs. 10), and Bit.ly URLs also allow enable realtime tracking. You can also post to your Twitter feed directly from Bit.ly’s Web interface. Choosing Bit.ly is just as much of a gamble as using other services, however.