But the move is also bad news for competing URL shorteners from third-party developers.

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You can now click a URL directly from your timeline without having to open the related tweet.

ENGADGET

When your regular URL is requested from a smartphone, the mobile site presents automatically with the most important elements and less graphics.

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Hackers simply load a program from the Internet and put it in the url of the site they want to attack.

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Network Magic provides easy remote access to important, shared files when away from home by creating your own home network URL on the Internet.

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Open a Web page, and your browser includes a single URL, but the page you are viewing is actually made up of content from all over the place.

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Search engines (and, probably URL shorteners and anyone with a search box) are required to drop your links from their results, ad networks stop serving you (or your ads), and your payment provider stops working with you.

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From an SEO standpoint, there is some degree of leverage in using the same URL structure across desktop and mobile content versions.

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