OT: TinyURL

[Stroller]

On 4 Jun 2008, at 18:12, Joseph Reeves wrote:
> ...
> TinyURL on the other hand... Why would anyone ever use that? I never
> click on links unless I know where they link to. Here's a plan for
> abuse:
>
> 1: Discover browser 0-day exploit
> 2: Put up a gallery of FreeRunner pictures on a website
> 3: Point a tinyurl at the gallery
> 4: Wait until everyone's linked to it and is clicking it
> 5: Change gallery to 0-day exploit
>
> Or even easier:
>
> 1: Link to goatse.
>
> TinyURL takes all the best practice Internet guidlines you try and
> teach people and ruins them all. Can't stand it.

TinyURL itself protects you from this.

All you do is go to <http://tinyurl.com/preview.php>, click on the  
"enable previews" link and it sets a cookie on your PC. Thereafter,  
everytime you click on a TinyURL link it shows you first what website  
the link redirects to, and you then have to click again to make a  
"manual redirection".

Maybe your email client is perfect, and never has a problem with  
mangled URLs, but for the rest of us TinyURL is very useful.

Stroller.