boy meets url

How many URL shortening services do you think there are? Believe it or not, Mashable just did a roundup of 90 URL shortening services! Holy smokes, batman! How can there be so many solutions for such a simple task? Aren’t they all the same? Well, not really. While most of these services are very similar, there are some that offer some unique special features. I will reveal my favorite from these 90 services.

Anyone who uses Twitter knows all about TinyUrl and appreciates its shrinking abilities because it allows us to get more bang for our buck with our 140 character limit. I’ve been using a service called MooURL.com because it was the only service that allowed you to create customized shortened URLs, which made remembering them much easier. They aren’t the only ones offering this unique customizable short URLs.

SnipURL not only allows you to create your own unique shortened URLs but it goes beyond that. They actually let you create an account so that you could actually manage every shortened URL you create and use. This neat little feature makes re-using shortened URLs so much easier. Here is a screenshot of its management interface.

Final Thoughts

Yes, I know that URL shortening services aren’t that important in the grand scheme of things, but if you need them for activities such as microblogging or chatting, then why not use something that gives you the most features. SnipURL appears to be the best of breed thus far to me. Yes, Pistachio, I know all about http://is.gd and how it’s the shorterst URL for any url shortening service, but it doesn’t have all of the bells and whistles that I want and need.