Make Shorter iTunes Podcast Links
I recently listed my podcast at the iTunes Store and wanted a shorter way to give out the URL. The standard link you get by right-clicking the tile is this monstrosity:
Note that the important part is the last nine characters, the iTunes numeric ID. Apple's Scott Simpson clued me in to this little-known shorter version of the URL:
That's much better, but still not very memorable. If you register at SnipURL.com, you can make even shorter links. Here's the one I came up with for the show:
And, of course, if you own your own domain, you could simply set up a page with a meta refresh, name it index.html, and place it in an appropriate subdirectory like myshow. Then your link would be http://www.yoursite.com/myshow. Here's the tag for the index.html page (substitute your ID for mine):
<META HTTP-EQUIV=REFRESH CONTENT="0; URL=http://www.itunes.com/podcast?id=207870198">If you have server access, usability experts recommend using an HTTP redirect instead of a refresh.
UPDATE, 2009-05-14: Short podcast links are now working again. And there's an even shorter format: Now you can drop the "www." To wit: http://itunes.com/podcast?id=207870198
UPDATE, 2009-10-08: Thanks to podcaster Sam Levin, I discovered there's a short link to specific podcast episodes as well. Right-click the episode title in iTunes, copy the link, and then chop it down to this format, where the first number is the episode ID and the second is the podcast ID: http://itunes.com/podcast?i=61406544&id=330051285
Categories
Audio
Read More Entries by David Battino.
Become an O'Reilly Member
Visit the Digital Media Forums
Subscribe to the Digital Media Blog Feed
Subscribe to the Digital Media Newsletter
Thanks for the tip! This makes for much nicer-looking URLs. :)
@Torsten: Yes, that link format stopped working recently, although it's still listed as valid in Apple's tech specs. I've emailed Apple tech support.
Interestingly, there is a new link format for other items in the store. iPhone applications, for example, are
http://itunes.com/app/AppName, though I haven't had luck making that work for all applications I've tried.Here's an example for Looptastic Electro Edition Lite, an iPhone app on which I consulted:
The short version of the link doesn't work for me.
Kind regards
Torsten