Shorten that URL with is.gd

Move over tinyurl, now there’s something even more teeny-weeny.

http://IS.GD

What is it?

is.gd is a service that shortens URLs. Short URLs come in handy when you have a super-long URL and you want to include them in documents or email, like a complex and deep-rooted SharePoint link. Short URLs also come in handy when posting on micro-sharing sites like twitter where you’re limited to 140 characters per post.

How does it work?
Simply type (or copy/paste from your browser’s address bar) the URL which you’d like to make smaller into the text box on the main page. Push the “Compress That Address!” button, and is.gd will make the address smaller for you, and give you a new link. You can then copy this new URL wherever you’d like to use it.

Best practices (taken from http://is.gd/description.php)
Here are a few…

• Shorten web addresses for emails, forum posts, blogs etc. which cannot handle long URLs and might wrap them, making them unclickable
• Lower the character count when texting web addresses to a mobile phone
• Hide the real URLs of affiliate links from visitors to your site
• Obscure your real email address from bots which harvest them to spam (enter an address like mailto:myaddress@myisp.com)
• Circumvent protections on sites which don’t allow direct links to a competitor’s site (if you are violating a site’s terms you do so at your own risk)
• Clean up bookmarks for social bookmarking sites or sites with low character limits like Twitter
• If you dislike a website and have to mention it (e.g. when complaining about it), link via is.gd so that your link does not help the site’s search engine positioning