Howdy!

Twitter has changed the way they handle URLs and are now shortening all un-shortened URLs. The following are the latest changes:

*Twitter is shortening all unshortened links. When a message is posted to Twitter, Twitter shortens any FULL links found in the tweet and drops the http://.

Example:

• Original: "Check out http://help.hootsuite.com/"
• Twitter and HootSuite will both display: "Check out help.hootsuite.com"  (again note the lack of http://)

*Twitter is also double wrapping ALL links. This means that they are collecting click-throughs on ALL urls posted.

 *Some 3rd Party Clients Will Handle These Changes Differently. Twitter sends 3rd Party Clients the original Ow.ly link replace with t.co. HootSuite then rewrites the link to the original Ow.ly version.

Example:

• Original: "Check out http://owly.abcde"
• Twitter and HootSuite both display: "Check out ow.ly/abcde"
• Other 3rd Party Clients will display either  "Check out t.co/vwxyz" Or "Check out ow.ly/abcde"

*Lastly, messages with Ow.ly links (that were previously wrapped as t.co urls) will automatically have 20 characters reserved, even though Ow.ly only uses 18 characters per link. (This is because t.co urls are 20 characters long)