Forum Bowlderizing/Breaking my URLs

[Slea]

Whenever I post a URL, whether I just post it and let the bullitan board do it's code thing, or use the "insert a link" button, or hand type the UBB code myself, this forum strips out part of my URL and renders it inoperable.

See: http://........com/4q2sosk

Although, come to think of it, is this only happening with Tiny URL? I shall see:

Bowlderizing - Google Search

 

[Slea]

Well it surely is... why would it do that?

 

[oldsoldier]

tnyurl is probably being caught by the forum filters.

The forum auto parses urls so you can post the actual url and it will become a named link in your post, so why not just post the full url?

 

[AngusATAT]

Many of the "URL shorteners" are blocked here, thanks to some folks who think it's funny to link to inappropriate sites with them because they're harder to catch.

As oldsoldier suggests, just use the full URL. It should work fine.

 

[Slea]

Yeah, I noticed the full URL was working. It's just become habitual to try to make things into tiny urls. A habit I'll have to break.

 

[rolygate]

Try and see it from our point of view:

- We get over 100,000 posts a month, that's ~3,500 posts a day, several a second at peak times
- There are tens of thousands of visitors a day, we run multiple dedicated servers to cope with the traffic
- There are 3 million pages on the sitemap
- ECF is one of the largest forums in the world
- The electronic cigarette market is expanding at a tremendous rate, and all the internet marketers/affiliates want to get in on the act
- The first place they attack is here, because ECF is the biggest, and the global centre, with thousands of new buyers looking for info here every day
- They try and get their spam in any way they can
- Somehow we have to stop them and it's a 24/7 fight
- We have about 15 staff but sometimes it's not enough

So basically ECF is not like your regular small, close community where things are easily managed - it's a monster city with hundreds of different communities, plus a very large commercial contingent. Keeping the lid on it is not easy, some days. Because of that we have to employ some systems that are just not necessary on smaller forums. Spare a thought for the poor old Forum Manager and the mods, they are like a thin blue line...

 

[Zal42]

Yeah, I noticed the full URL was working. It's just become habitual to try to make things into tiny urls. A habit I'll have to break.

It's a good habit not to have in any case. Many people, including myself, will almost never click a link that is a URL shortener, for a variety of reasons. Using the full URL makes your link more generally useful.