There’s a New URL Shortener In Town

That’s right. And it’s URL is bloq.in. I like to experiment with the scripts that other developers create and PHPurl is an awesome one. Written by Nile Flores, it’s a simple script that does exactly what you need it to do: shorten your URL. It also has the nice feature of allowing you to set a keyword for the URL you are shortening. For example, if the link is about the late Michael Jackson (we miss you, MJ), then your URL would be something like “http://bloq.in/michaeljackson“. If a keyword has already been used, you will be prompted to enter something else. Simple and awesome.

The other beauty of Bloq.in and PHPurl is that instead of using a random 3 or 4 characters as the URL, it goes by single digits counting up from 1. So until it reaches the 1,000′s, the URL is gonna be short and sweet (unless you use some /longobnoxioustaginstead).

The admin panel is also fantastic. It shows the amount of hits for each link users have added, which IP each link was posted from and you can also create new links and edit existing ones.

Making it all look purdy

I’m the type that likes to redesign everything to my liking and PHPurl wasn’t going to escape from my web developer clutches. So I took it upon myself to redesign the administrator panel, as well as the front-end so that everything matched Bloqhead.com.

Redesigned PHPurl admin panel

Redesigned PHPurl admin panel

So there you have it. A plug for my new URL shortener Bloq.in and a small review for PHPurl.

Twitter Fake URL Scam

About 5 minutes ago I was followed by someone that gave away the strong essence of “bot”. Lo and behold, a bot it was. If you’re new to the world of Twitter, the username is a dead give away. Usually bot usernames will consist of random characters and make absolutely no sense.

Beware this latest method. Here’s how it went down:

  1. Received a follow notification via email, knew it was a bot (the erratic characters in the username)
  2. Click on user’s profile link regardless (to block them)
  3. Click on the user’s profile URL out of curiosity
  4. Was slightly thrown when it lead to the Twitter home page
  5. Checked the URL of the page I was viewing and realized the deal

Twitter Scam

Twitter Scam

These bots are farming Twitter accounts to pedal their garbage. This type of stuff pisses me off. If you click a link anywhere that leads you to the Twitter home page and you notice something weird about it don’t log into the website. If you do, you can kiss your Twitter account goodbye.