Sometimes, if you try to get a link to a website to post (here or anywhere else), you will see a link which is long, often very long.
If the link is something like this:
helvella . com /?<loads of stuff>
that is most likely do some of the following:
Identifying the person who was logged into the website. Or who received an email containing the link. Not just who, but where they are and even when it was sent to them.
Identifying that the link was part of some sort of campaign - such as an emailing of all customers/registered users.
Identifying what group of users. If the campaign was targeted at women, for example, or age, or other information that they know about the person they sent an email to.
Identifying that the person is an affiliate of the site and, if the link is used, especially if used to buy something, who will receive the commission.
Mostly, if you just use the first part of the link, before but not including the question mark, it will still work but won't pass on all this information.
(We have a policy against posting most affiliate links.)
Try the link before the question mark, on its own:
helvella . com /
If that works, just post that. Sometimes it won't work - e.g. if the link is to same sort of search when it will contain the search terms.
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I wouldn't be surprised if some of them do many devious things.
I don't know what Amazon do, but you could imagine:
The big retail site (BRS) sees someone logged into their site - let's call that person Alice. BRS records your purchasing and browsing history in their systems. And add a unique number to the long string of information.
You send that link to someone else - Bob - and they use it. BRS can then use this unique number to link Alice with Bob. If BRS then look at Bob's browsing and purchasing history, they might see similarities and differences to Alice's history. Say, Alice bought a hammer one day, a nail the next. Then Bob uses the link Alice sent to buy a hammer. BRS will assume Bob will now want to buy nails. And add them to emails or "suggestions" that Bob sees on the BRS site.
No-one really cares about hammers and nails but there are things you might not want random others to know about. Even the trivial example of buying birthday and Christmas presents.
That’s exactly what’s going on. You used to be able to hit a button that gave a short link to copy abs paste but that’s been removed 🙄 it’s the very devil to get rid of the of junk added to it there must be an easy way. There used to be ☹️
But how do you know where the link will take you? You only have my word for it.
It went from being a generally useful technique to an invitation to visit sites you would never wish to go anywhere near - full of viruses, trojans, etc.
No it’s wasn’t tinyurl. It just removed all the add on gobbledygook giving a nice clean and clear link. Obvious what it was linking to. It was next to the breadcrumbs window but since the latest update it’s vanished 😬
That’s what our IT guy called them all the data in the url. That was years back when I was a CMS databasing wizard before hypothyrodism completely destroyed my analytical mind. They used eating as the naming system so that’s why it’s bytes, menu etc there’s even a nibble which is some tiny piece of data
The above comes from a link to a specific post on this forum, received in my HU Daily Digest email.
The bit before the ?, takes me directly to the individual post on this forum. The bit after the ? tells the HU stats bot that it came from their Daily Digest email.
Thanks helvella, that's going to be very useful. It's also helpful to understand what the extra bits mean.
Sometimes my daughter sends me a link to something she thinks I should buy, such as grandchildren's birthday presents. I've tried cutting it down and it still works.
I've also wanted to send her a link to an article in my online newspaper which comes as an email. When I open the link in my browser it comes up with loads of stuff after the ?. When I remove that I still get the article I wanted and can send her the reduced link.
You can just use the Amazon Standard Identification Number (ASIN) - B0025B0UPM - and do your own search for that product. That stops any information associating the link sender with the link recipient. (Unless it is so rarely looked at they can assume that Alice saw it, and passed it on to Bob, who used it a few minutes later.)
I always remove the text in links from the question mark onwards, and I always test the truncated link before I post it - but occasionally I've found that they simply don't work which is very annoying. So, sometimes the garbage has to stay.
If you want to find documents about levothyroxine that are available from the MHRA (PILs and SPCs), you can go to their website and type "levothyroxine" into their search box.
If you truncate it from the question mark onwards, it reverts to just being a link to the site with "search/" tacked on- not to a specific group of documents. As here:
Content on HealthUnlocked does not replace the relationship between you and doctors or other healthcare professionals nor the advice you receive from them.
Never delay seeking advice or dialling emergency services because of something that you have read on HealthUnlocked.
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