Twitter integrates automatic link shortening

Twitter is making it easier for microbloggers to share links on the social networking site.

The company has launched a built-in link shortening service that automatically condenses long URLs down to 19 characters.

According to Twitter President of Global Revenue Adam Bain, 80 percent of Twitter's on-site engagement consists of people clicking on links.

Link-shortening services such as Bit.ly, Google URL Shortener, and TinyURL have proved to be popular on the microblogging platform, which limits users to just 140 characters per post. They also provide users with link analytics (a feature that Twitter's own URL shortener does not provide).

To shorten links on Twitter.com using Twitter's automatic link-shortening service "[j]ust paste a link of any length into the Tweet box on Twitter.com. After you've composed your Tweet and you hit the 'Tweet' button, we'll shorten the link so that it only takes up 19 characters," said Twitter in a June 7 blog post.

Shortened links will be assigned a t.co link ID but "will appear as a shortened version of the original URL, so people who see your Tweet will know the site they are going to," said Twitter.

Links shortened using Twitter's link service are checked against a list of potentially dangerous sites to reduce click fraud and incidences of malware spreading through the microblogs.