I suggest the development of a Hive dapp that works as a link shortener (for links within the Hive ecosystem as well as whitelisted external websites).
It is important to note that a "dapp" means decentralized application, which means as many people as possible should be able to use, inspect, and modify the code to such software, such that being FOSS (Free and Open-Source) should be an obvious requirement for dapps.
I have published a brief summary of this idea on a comment 3 years ago. Here's the long post to describe the specifics.
The specifics
- Let's say that a link shortener Hive dapp has a domain name
hivelink.ioand that a Hive account named @shorten wants to use the dapp to shorten @savvyplayer/re-magnacarta-4k32en. The dapp should ask the user whether to have their own name for the link supplied (such asmc, by which the shortened link will behttps://hivelink.io/@shorten/mc), or a random name (that is easy to remember and type) to be generated. The list of shortened links by the user should be available at https://hivelink.io/@shorten. - Any shortened link by a user should also be accessible by its number as an alternative to its name. For example, if
https://hivelink.io/@shorten/mcis the first shortened link on the list, then it should also be accessible by athttps://hivelink.io/@shorten/1). - Each user of the link shortener gets to publish a post (with rewards burnt or declined) on the Hive blockchain (which will also help promote such dapp), or on a comment on a post which is dedicated to link shortening. Every time the user wants to add, edit, or remove a link, that post (or comment) will simply be edited to reflect changes.
- It would be helpful to create a human-readable format on the post with formatting similar to
[shortened link] -> [target original link]. For example,https://hivelink.io/@shorten/mcwill be listed together with @savvyplayer/re-magnacarta-4k32en. - It would also help to add a machine-readable list on the bottom of the page (better use the
<sub></sub>tags to decrease the size of text) with a format similar to[ID of link], [name of link], [target link]to help other Hive dapps process links more easily. For example,https://hivelink.io/@shorten/mcas the first shortened link will be saved as1, mc, https://peakd.com/hive-167922/@savvyplayer/re-magnacarta-4k32en. - People without Hive accounts (or those who don't want to use their Hive accounts) should still be able to use the dapp, though only with restrictions such as links pointing only to popular Hive frontends and no custom names for links, and those links will be saved only on the particular instance which they used just like Web2.
Advantages
- The code being FOSS means that any Hive user with enough technical knowledge can launch (and make minor modifications to) their own decentralized link shortener on Hive.
- Minor useful modification suggestions include shortening links for only whitelisted domains (such as for Hive blogging frontends like #PeakD or #Ecency) to avoid using the link shortener for unsafe purposes. While any shortened link is already on the Hive blockchain, using an instance of the decentralized link shortener for a non-whitelisted domain on any instance of the dapp would simply not be redirected (so users can either choose another available instance or launch their own instance).
- Even if there is no instance of such dapp being accessible, whatever links have already been shortened on the dapp can still be accessible on any Hive blogging frontend (or Hive block explorer).
- The dapp takes advantage of the security and censorship-resistance of the Hive blockchain (if used with a Hive account).
- It may encourage people not yet on Hive to create their own Hive accounts to use the dapp, thus help onboard more users.
- It can be marketed as a Hive's Web3/decentralized link shortener.
Possible disadvantages
- Writing code for such link shortener dapp will take a lot of time and effort, and keeping the code up-to-date is also an ongoing task which will take even more time and effort. This disadvantage can be mitigated by publishing posts about the development of such dapp whose rewards will do to the development team, or by asking for funding from the Hive DHF.
- Such dapp can be used for malicious purposes, so operators of instances of the dapp should try to moderate unsafe links on their respective instance.
Other
 | Hyperlink image from Pixabay to serve as cover image |
The #DBuzz ecosystem used to have a link shortener https://myhive.li/ (which is a fork of the FOSS software Yourls) and https://dbuzz.link/, both of which are currently inaccessible. This is
Tagging some Hive users who recently replied (within the past 6 days) under my previous posts. @rzc24-nftbbg @pepetoken @kenny-crane @tydynrain @borniet @jmis101 @iceledy @caelum1infernum @astramar @svanbo @crrdlx @slothlydoesit