diff --git a/app/controllers/hacks_controller.rb b/app/controllers/hacks_controller.rb
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..42bafd6f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/app/controllers/hacks_controller.rb
@@ -0,0 +1,35 @@
+# bad code that should be seriously checked over before entering one of the
+# other prim and proper files in the nice section of this repo
+class HacksController < ApplicationController
+  include ActionView::Helpers::TextHelper # string truncate method
+
+  def load_url_title
+    authorize :Hack
+    url = params[:url] # TODO verify!?!?!?!
+    response, url = get_with_redirects(url)
+    title = get_encoded_title(response)
+    render json: { success: true, title: title, url: url }
+  rescue StandardError => e
+    render json: { success: false, error_type: e.class.name, error_message: e.message }
+  end
+
+  private
+
+  def get_with_redirects(url)
+    uri = URI.parse(url)
+    response = Net::HTTP.get_response(uri)
+    while response.code == '301'
+      uri = URI.parse(response['location'])
+      response = Net::HTTP.get_response(uri)
+    end
+    [response, uri.to_s]
+  end
+
+  def get_encoded_title(http_response)
+    title = http_response.body.sub(/.*<title>(.*)<\/title>.*/m, '\1')
+    charset = http_response['content-type'].sub(/.*charset=(.*);?.*/, '\1')
+    charset = nil if charset == 'text/html'
+    title = title.force_encoding(charset) if charset
+    truncate(title, length: 140)
+  end
+end
diff --git a/app/policies/hack_policy.rb b/app/policies/hack_policy.rb
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..b6fbf6ce
--- /dev/null
+++ b/app/policies/hack_policy.rb
@@ -0,0 +1,5 @@
+class HackPolicy < ApplicationPolicy
+  def load_url_title?
+    true
+  end
+end
diff --git a/config/routes.rb b/config/routes.rb
index fe48b6ba..84112d23 100644
--- a/config/routes.rb
+++ b/config/routes.rb
@@ -80,4 +80,8 @@ Metamaps::Application.routes.draw do
   get 'users/:id/details', to: 'users#details', as: :details
   post 'user/updatemetacodes', to: 'users#updatemetacodes', as: :updatemetacodes
   resources :users, except: [:index, :destroy]
+
+  namespace :hacks do
+    get 'load_url_title'
+  end
 end
diff --git a/frontend/src/Metamaps/PasteInput.js b/frontend/src/Metamaps/PasteInput.js
index d14a0cf4..13258857 100644
--- a/frontend/src/Metamaps/PasteInput.js
+++ b/frontend/src/Metamaps/PasteInput.js
@@ -88,6 +88,18 @@ const PasteInput = {
       import_id,
       {
         success: function(topic) {
+          $.get('/hacks/load_url_title', {
+            url: text
+          }, function success(data, textStatus) {
+            var selector = '#showcard #topic_' + topic.get('id') + ' .best_in_place'
+            if ($(selector).find('form').length > 0) {
+              $(selector).find('textarea, input').val(data.title)
+            } else {
+              $(selector).html(data.title)
+            }
+            topic.set('name', data.title)
+            topic.save()
+          })
           TopicCard.showCard(topic.get('node'), function() {
             $('#showcard #titleActivator').click()
               .find('textarea, input').focus()