They're one of many competitors in an eco-system that's relatively easy to enter, other competitors have a significant advantage over them, and I have no idea what their business model is. When they said they no longer wanted to sink money into their project, I understood why.
I also understand that people often feel entitled to free services, would complain when one goes away, and they might not have been prepared for that kind of social pressure. I understand giving in to it.
I understand that too, but most of the people I saw talking about tr.im were saying "Go figure" not "Please stay". This on top of the asking bit.ly for money rather than saying "Ok" to keep the links working, while complaining about money issues.
It seems like this was a ploy to get people's attention for tr.im so they could try to sell it.
Why would they want to give their work to a company that cuddled up to Twitter thanks to connections and took the entire market in a matter of months? I'd want some money out of that too.
I understood the bit.ly absorption to be more of a courtesy than an attempt to profit. Giving their redirects to a company that has the infrastructure and the long term support to keep them on-line, rather than just let them go dark, would be responsible and really wouldn't help bit.ly increase it's user base at all.
In fact, laws were passed to stop the practice of having a "going out of business sale" when the business was not failing because it was once a common advertising strategy. In some states, you even have to register such sales with the Attorney General
I believe this was also to combat a 'scam' where store owners (the example I heard was Persian carpets) would mark things up, and then have a going out of business sale that would mark them down to above the original price.
Yeah but there is a law against anti-competitive actions too, like Twitter not allowing users choice within their profile setting on the site to select shortener of their choice.
Also, Apple and At&t rejecting apps that clearly are rejected because the app is their competition(Skype for one).
This is all new territory and these companies might be the impetus for much needed precedence!
If it is a PR stunt, it's pretty crass. But I doubt it's PR - they don't make any money on links, so a hike in traffic just means more costs.
Considering that they did intend to keep the old URLs functioning, and that users can get the same free service from dozens of URL shorteners, the whole thing just seems weird.
