

Ask YC: Feedback on an alternative to TinyURL - crystalarchives
http://www.oneryng.com/assign

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pierrefar
It's quite a long URL, so not really "tiny".

The idea itself has been tried several times before. CompuServe (or was that
AOL?) was one of the first to have keyword-based navigation. A few years ago,
I met an entrepreneur in London, UK, who was building a company through which
you create a unique number for yourself, and that gets associated with all
your contact details - sort of like a phone number but to all your contact
details (a bit like a LinkedIn public profile I guess). There are other
variations.

Personally, I find this way of navigation weird and I don't like it. Also, the
domain name your service uses (oneryng.com) doesn't really brand the service
in a useful way (but I do love the domain name!).

Also, what's your unique selling proposition? I can't see one!

Apologies if I seem a bit blunt. Please correct me if I misunderstood
something.

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crystalarchives
No, not at all blunt, this is exactly what I'm looking for. The unique selling
proposition is that I plan on shifting this idea to the mobile market, since
typing long URLs on a numpad is complete torture, and am just fleshing out the
idea for now as a proof of concept.

Thanks for the background information, it's very helpful. Any good suggestions
for a short, succinct domain name that's to the point?

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pierrefar
As a mobile user, I know exactly what you're talking about. But I have to say
that the new virtual keyboards from HTC and others have solved most of the bad
input problems.

Also, search engines are becoming more and more important for navigation on
mobile devices because as you say, typing long URLs is not fun but finding
them is easier. How will you compete with Google and Yahoo!?

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donal
I wouldn't use it just because the keyphrase is mutable. It is bad enough that
TinyURL obscures the destination, but with the possibility for the destination
changing without even the submitters knowledge makes the service completely
untrustworthy.

Maybe I'm missing something...

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crystalarchives
Yeah, the idea is for people who want an immutable keyphrase to contact me for
some sort of contract where they ask for a specified amount of time for the
keyphrase to stay constant for some reasonable sum of money.

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rksprst
Well, if that's your business plan, it seems like its nothing more than an
extension of domains... which provides no benefit to the customer. Why spend
money on a "keyphrase" when you can spend money on the actual domain?

I don't see what possible reason a person would have to pay for a keyphrase?
Most people use sites like tinyurl to send links to friends, why would I pay
for a service like that? If I was a company, I would just buy a domain with
that keyphrase (e.g. www.keyphrase.com) or do something like
companyname.com/keyphrase

I think a better monetization plan would be to load the long url link in an
iframe and put ads on the top of the page.

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crystalarchives
I'm trying to capitalize on the trend of searching for a company slogan or
phrase instead of going to the actual site. A lot of businesses are posting
ads (non-internet) that say "Go to Yahoo.com and search for <company name>"
instead of saying "Go to <company name>.com/<project name>".

This trend should increase with the proliferation of mobile web browsing;
typing a domain name is a pain, and I hope to make browser plugins for each
mobile browser that capitalizes on this new development.

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adrianwaj
<http://qurl.co.uk/> offers something for toolbar access

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crystalarchives
I'm most interested in whether the idea is easy to understand, any feedback is
very much appreciated!

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rksprst
The idea is easy to understand to anyone that knows that tinyurl is.
Otherwise, they might be confused. I think a screenshot of the address bar
showing a long url and your short "keyphrase" one would help explain your site
to your users. I also don't particularly like the design (e.g. the font, black
background, blue links...) I'd suggest a simple white page, something like the
google homepage.

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crystalarchives
The screenshot idea is genius, I'm going to try that. Simple is good, I'll
definitely take that into account.

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xlnt
you can overwrite people's keyphrases, and when you hit "back" to the main
page the captcha thing isn't visible.

also captchas suck.

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crystalarchives
I know, I hate captchas myself, but I don't want spammers to hammer the server
with porn sites or anything like that.

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xlnt
tinyurl doesn't have a captcha.

neither does comments or account creation on YC.

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crystalarchives
I removed it, I understand now - it's better to wait until entirely too much
spam arrives before implementing CAPTCHAs.

