

Panera Bread Blocks bit.ly links - PStamatiou
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/11/09/panera-bread-blocks-bit-ly-links/

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tptacek
Their network, their rules. This rule: not so great --- not because private
network operators shouldn't be able to filter their links, but because it
shows a lack of understanding of how HTTP works.

A smart salesguy at Bluecoat is going to see this story and make a mint.

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eli
Agreed. You'd think someone smart enough to set up the filtering would realize
that it doesn't make any sense.

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nir
Er, TheRealURL welcomes our new Panera Bread users.. :P
<http://therealurl.appspot.com/>

(Seriously though, it would interesting to see if Panera will face any issues
because of this - might be a measure of Twitter's real world significance)

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PStamatiou
I have been going to a local Panera in Atlanta at least once a week for the
last 3 or so years. I’m the type that gets a big meal, coffee and plugs in for
a few hours of work. I’d consider myself a pretty loyal customer. But now
this? (okay im just being sensationalist.. a simple bit.ly block isn't the end
of the world. if anything it'll give me the excuse i've been looking for to
get a 4G CLEAR wimax usb dongle for my laptop)

Their social media efforts are gonna get put to the test to see how they can
deal with all this negative (and rightly so) publicity.

Sure let them have filters for porn.. but that doesn’t mean you have to kill
all bit.ly links. Let the redirects work and if it goes to a malicious site
well then you can block that with whatever blacklist you want.

That being said, you might be able to get around this if you nudge their
provider, Wandering Wi-Fi. I might have been able to get them to stop asking
me (based on my laptop’s MAC address) to login…

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patio11
Somebody had to justify their salary for today, and they just did.

It is the inevitable curse of big organizations selling tasty sandwiches that
they eventually employ people whose personal success is totally unconnected to
selling tasty sandwiches.

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rick888
I was just at a Panera this past weekend with my laptop and I also noticed
they blocked anything with the word "torrent" in it, for obvious reasons ;-).

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asher
I think this is PR.

<http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html>

And I have great respect for the person who secured $2m in funding for an url-
shortening site.

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comster
I fucking hate short urls.... stupidly - unnecessary imposition of 140
characters has caused the removal of any context .

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ubernostrum
If you honestly believe that there were no shortened URLs prior to Twitter, or
that they've never been used for any other purpose, well... honestly, what
rock have you been hiding under the past six years?

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jrockway
I love the comments:

"As a general rule it works best if you keep gov out of private (Panera like)
businesses."

The right wing has such intelligent-sounding advocates!

