1 - Build a database of short to unshortened URLs as a backup in case that one of the shortening services goes under.
2 - Such a service can be useful for anyone who wants to know where the URL points to without clicking it (or without the skills to unshorten it themselves).
3 - It could allow for batch unshortening
4 - A database can still unshorten URLs that no longer exist etc..
I think I'm one, because I don't know of any way to unshorten these tiny URLs without visiting them or using some such service.
If you know of one, could you enlighten me? Thanks...
$ curl -I http://tinyurl.com/9a4xj6
HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently
X-Powered-By: PHP/5.2.8
Location: http://www.hostingcoupons.org/godaddy-coupons/
Content-type: text/html
Date: Fri, 24 Apr 2009 21:26:48 GMT
Server: TinyURL/1.6
>>> import urllib
>>> u=urllib.urlopen("http://tinyurl.com/9a4xj6")
>>> u.url
'http://www.hostingcoupons.org/godaddy-coupons/'
>>>