Discover Webfiction with StumbleUpon
Originally I had this great introduction with the lyrics of an amazing song by Daniel Lanois ft Bono, called Falling at Your Feet, but then it turned out it didn’t use the verb stumble at all. So no witty song lyric intro, alas. Instead, I’ll jump straight to the point.
Of all the social bookmarking sites available, I believe StumbleUpon is the most fun. I love the sense of random discovery, of finding people with similar tastes, and exploring new internet territories. So because this week is all about being social, and I’m all about sharing what I love, I thought I’d give a short introduction to the wondrous world of StumbleUpon. Be warned though: it’s very addictive.
The basics
StumbleUpon is a social bookmarking site, which means it’s a service of collecting and sharing bookmarked sites. When you join, you select some general interests and start to stumble, either by installing the Firefox toolbar (which I highly recommend) or use the on site stumble links (which work way slower, and have less features).
Clicking the stumble button will load random sites, based on the interests you selected. Once loaded, you can decide to give the site a thumbs up, a thumbs down, or no rating at all. These ratings affect how many times the site will be shared with other stumblers. The more you stumble, the more the engine understands your preferences, and the better profiled the sites shared with you become. With the Firefox toolbar you can also give a site a thumbs up even when you’re not actively stumbling, which makes it a great way to support the authors and sites you admire.
Tags & categories
If you thumb up a page that isn’t in the database yet, you’ve made a new discovery and are asked to fill in some minor details, like the category (also called topic), some tags and an (optional) review. These tags and categories are the basis of the system, since these are the things you subscribe to when selecting your interests. Tags are also the most convenient way to browse other people’s bookmarks. Tags are limited to 5 per site, so think before you tag!
Share with friends!
Of course, StumbleUpon wouldn’t be a social bookmarking site if you couldn’t share with friends!
There are various ways to see the sites your friends have bookmarked. First of all, people that subscribe to you receive sites you’ve thumbed up more often than regular people, and vice versa.
You can also stumble through the sites your friends have bookmarked by clicking the yellow stumble button on their page:
Lastly, you can press the orange people icon in the Firefox toolbar to stumble through the discoveries of your subscriptions. There’s also a direct share option, for people who have subscribed to each other and have approved sharing. With direct sharing you can send links directly to your friend’s inbox. The picture is a little small, but this is what the toolbar looks like:
Discover fiction
Now that I’ve covered the basics, it’s time to hunt down some fiction!
Through StumbleUpon, I’ve discovered several great short stories, some lovely poetry, and even great webfiction. Servicing the Pole, which was featured in our first Scavenger Hunt, was for example listed on Web Fiction Guide (by me) because I discovered it on StumbleUpon.
The lovely thing about StumbleUpon is the random discovery factor; you never know what you may find. If you’re looking for something new to read, subscribing to convenient categories like literature, poetry and books is a good start. However, these are very broad subjects, and cover everything from analysis to reviews. Subscribing to reading, short stories, or your favorite genre tags, like romance novels, or science fiction will give you more targeted results. And, last but not least, there’s also a webfiction tag.
If you’re a fan of randomly discovering new things, StumbleUpon is definitely the site for you, and you should give it a try.
(All fall down) All the books you never read
(All fall down) Just started
(All fall down) All the information
(All fall down) All the big ideas
(All fall down) All the radio waves
(All fall down) Electronic seas
They’re all falling at your feet*
*I couldn’t resist! It’s a beautiful song, and I find this chorus so fitting for the whole StumbleUpon experience!