Filed under: Internet, Productivity, Web services, web 2.0, Browsers
BurnURL offers short links with stats, social sharing
There are plenty of URL truncation options on the net already, and you've likely already got a favorite option like Is.gd or Snipr. Does the relatively new BurnURL provide anything that really makes it a compelling alternative?
If you're a social surfer, then the answer is yes. When you "burn" an address, the service creates your truncated address and provides a standard HTML link, embed code, and bbcode for you to copy and paste. A share bar is also displayed below so that you can quickly fire off your new link to services like Twitter, Facebook, Digg, and Reddit.
When someone else visits your burned URL, a relatively subtle toolbar is added to the top of the page that allows them to re-share it and give the page a thumbs up or down. The total hit count is also displayed in the bar.
I'd like to see a few more features added - like the ability to update statuses directly from BurnURL's site. If you want to post your link to Twitter, clicking the T icon currently opens your Twitter homepage in a new tab with the short URL pre-entered in the update field, which is a bit clunky. It's an extra step that power users would prefer to avoid.
Since the service is still fairly new and there's an API for developers to access, it likely won't be long before apps like Power Twitter begin to offer inline support. When they do, BurnURL will become a more attractive option.
If you're a social surfer, then the answer is yes. When you "burn" an address, the service creates your truncated address and provides a standard HTML link, embed code, and bbcode for you to copy and paste. A share bar is also displayed below so that you can quickly fire off your new link to services like Twitter, Facebook, Digg, and Reddit.
When someone else visits your burned URL, a relatively subtle toolbar is added to the top of the page that allows them to re-share it and give the page a thumbs up or down. The total hit count is also displayed in the bar.
I'd like to see a few more features added - like the ability to update statuses directly from BurnURL's site. If you want to post your link to Twitter, clicking the T icon currently opens your Twitter homepage in a new tab with the short URL pre-entered in the update field, which is a bit clunky. It's an extra step that power users would prefer to avoid.
Since the service is still fairly new and there's an API for developers to access, it likely won't be long before apps like Power Twitter begin to offer inline support. When they do, BurnURL will become a more attractive option.
So, just how good at time waster games are you? Think you've got the stuff? Well, The World's Hardest Game 2.0 doesn't think you do.
Yes, amazingly, it's possible to have a sequel to a game called "The World's Hardest Game". It doesn't seem logically possible, since if the first one was actually the world's hardest, how could another one come along and share the moniker? It made me doubt the name in the first place. That is, until I tried the game.
The mechanics of the game are very simple. You are a small red square, ...
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
James said 5:28PM on 3-06-2009
I like tr.im - it's a very similar service. They offer Tweeting directly from the page, and a whole host of stats on clicked URLs, as well as a really nice Firefox plugin that adds a shorten button and URL tracking graph to your sidebar.
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drew olanoff said 6:18PM on 3-06-2009
Thanks for the writeup Lee. We have gotten a lot of cool feedback and suggestions from those who are burnin' away and we have some stuff lined up that you'll see soon.
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Paul Nicholson said 10:20PM on 3-07-2009
URLZen.com does this, plus gives you an archive of all your previous URLZen's that you've tweeted - whether you created them or not.
Check out...
http://urlzen.com/http://paulnich.blogspot.com/2008/12/retweetbot-instruction-manual-for-users.html
and
http://www.urlzen.com/twitter/pwnicholson
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vcao said 3:40AM on 5-08-2009
"When someone else visits your burned URL, http://www.vcao.net a relatively subtle toolbar is added to the top of the page that allows them to re-share it and give the page a thumbs up or down. The total hit count is also displayed in the bar."
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