Techcrunch reports that the federal government has launched its own link shortening service. Not to be outdone by its hundreds of competitors, like the outgoing tr.im, the original Tiny URL, or the currently chic bit.ly, government employees can now use the oh so svelte http://go.usa.gov.
So http://recovery.gov gets “shortened” to…http://go.usa.gov/liO. Wait, that’s not shorter at all, it’s two characters longer! YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG.
Granted, this isn’t a bad idea…in theory. First, who knows how long any commercial shortening service will last? Second, it’s nice to have a trusted service, one that (hopefully) won’t direct readers to pictures of a repulsively ripped rectum.
Then again communism works…in theory. Seriously, how many .govs can there be? I think http://u.gov is wide open! No one else can even take it but you, the federal government of the United States! In fact, you’d be the shortest shortener in the biz! C’mon, prove that you can beat the private sector in at least one thing!