Top 7 Annoying StumbleUpon Mistakes
Mistakes, by electrospray.
OK, I'm nearing my 10.000 "like it" stumbles (only ca. 1000 left) and I'm wondering how I can help people to make better use of StumbleUpon and not repeat the same mistakes over and over. Well, I came up with the simple idea of outlining these most annoying stumble mistakes.
1. Thumbing down a story because you do not like what happened
You do not like a severely injured 16 year olds being tasered 19 times by Police? What do you do? Thumb it up and review it so that more people can read about this outrageous incident (one in long row of taser casualties btw.) or do you thumb it down because you think the Police sucks so that others do not have to read the about the police being very baaad?
2. Submitting the latest gadget or software to the Science category
What do you think? Where does the new iPhone, netbook or online photo editor fit in best? Science (science/tech) or cell phones, electronic devices, computers, computer hardware, software, graphic design? Use the right, specific SU categories! We're not at Digg where everything is "tech". Just because you found something on the Internet does not mean it fits in the "Internet" category.
3. Reviewing stolen content instead of the original artist
Are you sure that the "Funny Blog" with all the blinking ads deserves your review more on its "interesting/amazing/cool images" post which has no link to or even an artist's name mentioned or the the original artist who has even his URL on the stolen images? Do not support content theft!
4. Writing the same review for several stumblers in a row
Do you assume that I will appreciate your "great work, keep it up" review when I see that you reviewed 5 other stumblers in 3 minutes with the exact same words? You might end up labeled "spam".
5. Requesting friendship with no context whatsoever
Hey reader, you read the same StumbleUpon as I do, want to become friends? I am a lot like you, the friendliest bot around!
6. Requesting a thumb up or review when you never ever stumble my stuff
Do you think that befriending me means you can send me at least one request a day or several per week, especially as it's the only time I see your avatar at all, you request the same site stumbled each time and I still am not the slightest interested in this subject?
7. Writing obnoxious condescending "reviews" where you disagree
Do you assume that everybody who is concerned with the environmental or rather planetary risks of the so called LHC black hole factory and has no PhD in nuclear physics is a moron?
There is no particular order to this list, but today the annoyances accumulated. I encountered all of them recently. StumbleUpon is a fine place and I still like it although I tried several other social browsing services, the latest is Browzmi.
So please, attempt not to repeat these stumble mistakes outlined above. I don't want to leave SU for Browzmi yet although it has none of these annoyances yet.
Well said, Tad! One thing about the categories, though: as many categories as there are to choose from, it can sometimes be difficult to choose the most appropriate one. There’s no “social media” category – but there’s Internet, Cyberculture, and Marketing. If I stumbled this post, which one would I choose? You can easily eliminate Marketing, because it doesn’t really talk about social media marketing. Internet, I agree, is pretty broad and catch-all. I would likely choose Cyberculture, because I think it fits pretty well there.
If I can air one annoyance of mine. Say you stumble a new page or video that contains a few F-bombs. If you mark it as having adult content, SU automatically overrides your original category choice with Pornography. Even if there was no nudity.
thumbing down! -5
Great post! I wrote a rant yesterday pertaining to SocialBrowse, but I believe it also applies to StumbleUpon as well. Check it out if you like: http://www.thattalldude.com/main/2008/08/abusing-socialb.html
Kari: Thanks Kari, basically I rarely use the “Internet” category as it’s so broad that you always annoy some people. Post about StumbleUpon can be submitted in the StumbleUpon” category though :-)
v00v4: Thumbing this down or do you refer to “thumbing down” as a mayor annoyance? :-)
The categorisation issue is a pet peeve for me. Heaps of my posts have been classified in the science/tech category. Is it any wonder people don’t thumb it when they’re expecting science related content…?
filling the damn index with spam is my main problem with some users. granted everyone these days has something to promote, but try not to spam everyone
I just wish Stumble would let us delete things we discovered. I discovered posts that are not even there anymore. I wrote them about it, but don’t know what they’ve done.
I rarely thumb down anything. I just pass on by. Because I believe in different strokes for different folks.
Great thinking and very relevant. Content and the context of the content. Good stuff.
really nice i stumbled this so people know about it. secondly i want to add there is no other way that toolbar to like pages i mean what the heck?! we always have to have firefox installed what if i am in net cafe? at cousin’s place and he hates firefox? and another false fan counts i found this annoying many times on your main profile the digits are different than actual digits.
I thumb down material that is poorly written. I thumb up stuff that is well written / photographed. I do not thumb down for controversial material or even stuff I disagree with. But I WILL thumb down for innocent material that is overwhelmed with adult affiliate ads.
I agree, there should be sub-categories in the “adult” classification for nudity, sexual contact or innuendo, violence, foul language, hate speech, gore (photos of fetueses in jars, for instance).
yeah rightly said and one more thing there are some stumblers who try to bully around new stumblers like me for example.. I totally agree with you thumbed!
chethan: The stumble trolls are infamous but your problem is related to #3 – content theft. Your blog is full of it. Quit it so people won’t bother you.
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great tips.. i am new to stumbleupon and your article is a good help. thanks for sharing.