Prepare For The Facebook Vanity URL Landrush

http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/05/31/prepare-for-the-facebook-vanity-url-landrush/?awesm=tcrn.ch_2tJ&utm_campaign=techcrunch&utm_content=techcrunch-autopost&utm_medium=tcrn.ch-twitter&utm_source=direct-tcrn.ch

by peter123 • 17 years ago

27 27 17 years ago

techcrunch.com

zach2• 17 years ago

Is it weird that I still don't use GMail much because my customary username (not this one) was taken by the time I finagled an invite? I don't really have a second choice, so I just stick with Yahoo! Mail. I guess I'm more vain than I think...

tomjen• 17 years ago

Depends - I hate having to keep track of a thousand different usernames, so I think it makes sense to stick to one.

andyking• 17 years ago

My name's ever so common - it's taken in all the popular domain extensions, all the major email services, most of the social sites (I got in early on Twitter!). It's a pain; I don't want to use a "nickname" and I really don't want numbers at the end of my name.

Then again, because so many people share my name, I'm barely traceable on Google which I quite like.

(It's the reason I use the startup email provider Zenbe. They had my name available. I just hope they don't go tits up!)

axod• 17 years ago

OTOH, If it's a commonish name/nick, you have to endure countless incorrect emails from people who have you confused with someone else.

johns• 17 years ago

I don't have a particularly unique name, but I get 5-10 emails to the wrong people per week.

Raphael• 17 years ago

You could use Gmail with your own domain name.

zach2• 17 years ago

I did end up setting up my startup domain with GMail. It made me want to make a "regular" GMail account, but I still couldn't get past the name thing.

Shamiq• 17 years ago

Should Facebook sell vanity URLs? If they do, should they allow a secondary market?

andrewl-hn• 17 years ago

Russian Facebook clone (Vkontakte.ru) sells vanity URLs for a price about 1k euros. I'm not sure about the official reselling policy, though.

staticshock• 17 years ago

Surprisingly, I'm not finding much evidence of a myspace url market. Has anyone seen anything high profile, like a url getting sold for 1k?

edd• 17 years ago

I know in the tech community its nice to be able to link together all of your different 'profiles' so that people can find them. However, I really don't see this as being a feature that 'normal' people will use. When was the last time you actually visited someone's profile page without following a link for them off either your news feed or a friends profile? Unless Facebook's game is to try and move away from the 'friendship' model and open the whole system up.

andymoe• 17 years ago

Of course people are going to use it; you don't think the type of people that like to collect "friends" are going to put up a vanity URL?

mcav• 17 years ago

Some will use it; most won't. Facebook search works well enough to satisfy most users' needs when actual hyperlinks aren't available.

pj2• 17 years ago

When you want to visit Facebook itself, do you type in http://69.63.184.142/ or http://www.facebook.com? User friendly will win in the end.

gnaritas• 17 years ago

Neither, I click the facebook bookmark on my toolbar.

baddox3• 17 years ago

My argument against Facebook vanity url's is that Facebook was originally designed to be for people who were actual friends irl. They could easily search for and add one another, and there was so need to give out static url's because there was no real public information other than a bit of profile info and a picture for search purposed.

whatusername• 17 years ago

I type facebook into my search box.

nazgulnarsil• 17 years ago

I call facebook.com/myspace

pj2• 17 years ago

If Facebook really cared about their users, this feature would have been available a long time ago.

TweedHeads• 17 years ago

I wish I could downvote propaganda.

huhtenberg• 17 years ago

peter123, what's up with the tracking stuff in the URL ?

www.techcrunch.com/2009/05/31/prepare-for-the-facebook-vanity-url-landrush/?awesm=tcrn.ch_2tJ&utm_campaign=techcrunch&utm_content=techcrunch-autopost&utm_medium=tcrn.ch-twitter&utm_source=direct-tcrn.ch

riklomas• 17 years ago

It looks like Techcrunch are using a URL shortening tool at http://awe.sm for their http://tcrn.ch domain. The utm_* is for Google Analytics tracking. I imagine peter123 didn't mean to submit the whole URL, but just got to the article through the shortener

sho2• 17 years ago

Fuck facebook. No seriously, who gives a shit.

sho2• 17 years ago

I guess I have an answer to my rhetorical question: those modding me down give a shit : D

zackattack• 17 years ago

I could see this being useful if Facebook evolves into more of a LinkedIn; people could put their Facebook URLs onto their business cards.

Also, when I meet a stranger, it would definitely be easier to find them if I could just go directly to their vanity URL, which might be more mnemonically accessible.

baddox3• 17 years ago

This doesn't seem in the spirit of what Facebook is (or perhaps was). The idea with Facebook for the average user was that only your friends (i.e. actual friends irl) could see your full profile, and others searching for you would just see a bit of info and a picture. Of course, that's changing now with celebrity and corporate fan pages, so I'm sure they're just trying to adapt, but I think they're getting away from the service they originally provided. I suppose to do that is to risk failure while hoping for the reward of becoming a broader service.

Prepare For The Facebook Vanity URL Landrush

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