Is the shortened URL expanded locally inside Emacs?
Does it refer to a real website?
Of course it refers to a real website, the idea is that you can use shortened URL in chat so the people you're chatting with could use it too.
 "what made that choice desirable?" it's working and it suits me well :/  shorten-url-base is customizable.

On Sat, Mar 2, 2019 at 6:35 AM Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org> wrote:
[[[ To any NSA and FBI agents reading my email: please consider    ]]]
[[[ whether defending the US Constitution against all enemies,     ]]]
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Is the shortened URL expanded locally inside Emacs?
Does it refer to a real website?

In the example it gives https://qps.ru/MjrtW as an example, Was
https://qps.ru/ chosen by your customization?  If so, what made that
choice desirable?  Why not use sh:e/ (abbreviation of "short:emacs")
instead?  It is much shorter.


--
Dr Richard Stallman
President, Free Software Foundation (https://gnu.org, https://fsf.org)
Internet Hall-of-Famer (https://internethalloffame.org)