Libya, The Internet, and bit.ly

February 19, 2011

Comments

Worries that Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi will shut down Internet access to stymie protesters apparently has some Americans concerned about the URL-shortner bit.ly, since the .ly domain is Libya’s. This is of particular concern since bit.ly is the default shortener for those of us who use Twitter.

Bit.ly CEO John Borthwick says not to worry:

Should Libya block Internet traffic, as Egypt did, it will not effect http://bit.ly or any .ly domain.

For .ly domains to be unresolvable the five .ly root servers that are authoritative *all* have to be offline, or responding with empty responses. Of the five root nameservers for the .ly TLD: two are based in Oregon, one is in the Netherlands and two are in Libya.

At http://bit.ly will continue to do everything we can to ensure we offer our users the best service we possibly can. That includes offering options around which top level domain you use. Many users choose to use http://j.mp/ as an alternative to http://bit.ly, given that it is shorter. Moreover, any http://bit.ly link can be re-written as a j.mp link by simply replacing the domain.

So there you have it.

4 responses to “Libya, The Internet, and bit.ly”

Boyd

February 19, 2011 at 10:06 am

I have always thought it odd that Twitterers (well, you’re the only one I follow on Twitter who uses bit.ly, James, since I only follow a handful of folks) use a Libyan-coded domain for this purpose. Not that I particularly object to anyone using it, mind you, but I probably wouldn’t use it myself. Of course, I only tweet about once a year anyway.

Plus, I’m waaaaaaay too long-winded for tweeting.
James Joyner

February 19, 2011 at 10:17 am

Bit.ly is the default in Twitter at TweetDeck, although there are other options. I actually never thought of it as a Libyan domain, in that the country codes are largely ignored and most of them are used for niche, non-country-related, purposes.
Boyd

February 19, 2011 at 10:54 am

I guess as a Middle East specialist during my Navy days, it leapt out at me as the Libyan TLD from the first time I saw it.
Mashhood

February 25, 2011 at 4:17 am

Nobody can block internet…. Coz therz no point in doin so…