making urls clickable for wordpress custom post type field?

Question

Here is the code I'm using to add a custom field to a post type I have set up. As you can see it creates an input box which allows me to add whatever I want. I want to put urls in this box (without the "http://", e.g. "example.com") and have them be automatically clickable. Is there a way?

add_action("admin_init", "add_friends_fields");

function add_friends_fields(){
    add_meta_box("artist_links", "Links", "artist_links", "friends", "normal", "low");
}

function artist_links(){
    global $post;
    $custom = get_post_custom($post->ID);
    $artist_links = $custom["artist_links"][0];
    ?>
    <label>Links:</label><br /><br />
    <input size="50" name="artist_links" value="<?php echo $artist_links; ?>" />
    <?php
}

-edit-

    <section id="artists">
        <h2 class="title"><span>Artists</span></h2>
        <?php
            $i=1;

            $temp = $wp_query;
            $wp_query = null;
            $wp_query = new WP_Query();
            $wp_query->query('post_type=friends&posts_per_page=-1');

            while ( $wp_query->have_posts() ) : $wp_query->the_post();

            $custom = get_post_custom($post->ID);
            $artist_links = $custom["artist_links"][0];
            $artist_bio = $custom["artist_bio"][0];
        ?>

        <article class="mgm-artist<?php if($i%6 == 0) { echo ' right'; }; $i++; ?>" id="post-<?php the_ID(); ?>">
            <?php if ( has_post_thumbnail() ) { the_post_thumbnail( 'video-thumb' ); } ?>
            <section class="artist-details">
                <p><span>Name:</span> <?php the_title(); ?></p>
                <p><span>Bio:</span> <?=$artist_bio?></p>
                <p><span>Link(s):</span> <?=$artist_links?></p>
            </section>
        </article>

        <?php
            endwhile; 
            $wp_query = null;
            $wp_query = $temp;
            wp_reset_query();
        ?>
    </section>

Answer 1

put this in your functions.php:

function my_format_artist_links($urls) {
    $urls = explode(',', $urls);
    $links = array();
    foreach ($urls as $url) {
        if (empty($url)) continue;
        $links[] = '<a href="http://'.$url.'">'.$url.'</a>';
    }
    return implode(',', $links);
}

and then replace

<p><span>Link(s):</span> <?=$artist_links?></p>

with

<p><span>Link(s):</span> <?php echo my_format_artists_links($artist_links); ?></p>'

Answer 2

just change $artist_links = $custom["artist_links"][0]; in your loop to

$artist_links = '<a href="'.$custom['artist_links'][0].'">'.get_the_title($post->ID).'</a>;