I've never quite understood URL shorteners. They seem like a way of opting into link rot and sending tracking data to third parties who aren't necessary for the client-server connection.
Is there a major benefit I'm missing? I could kind of see them if you have a character limit, want to hide the URL, or have to type a URL manually. But manual typing is rare, and even microblogging services are expanding character limits. Hiding the URL seems slightly sketchy, but you can achieve it without a shorter URL so maybe that's not a real benefit.
Anyway, I'm actually curious about this because people seem to love them.
(and this is aside from all the very valid issues and concerns people have with Google shutting down a widely used service).
Is there a major benefit I'm missing? I could kind of see them if you have a character limit, want to hide the URL, or have to type a URL manually. But manual typing is rare, and even microblogging services are expanding character limits. Hiding the URL seems slightly sketchy, but you can achieve it without a shorter URL so maybe that's not a real benefit.
Anyway, I'm actually curious about this because people seem to love them.
(and this is aside from all the very valid issues and concerns people have with Google shutting down a widely used service).