Top Stumblers Tell All
During StumbleUpon Week here at MikeBogo.com, I interviewed a few of the top Stumblers (people that SU has rated as the top users. The first is StarSpirit, the #1 top Stumbler who has rated positively over 111,000 pages and has 1266 fans - very impressive! Another is RChobert, who is the founder of VirtualVideoMap.com. Finally, we have GSSPP5, who is from Philadelphia.
Check out what they had to say about StumbleUpon:
Mike Bogo: Can you tell us a little bit about yourself?
RChobert: My professional background is in education and has morphed into the e-learning field. I know enough programming to make me dangerous in regards to developing some radical new ideas on the web, such as virtualvideomap.com. I enjoy developing web sites that give the user some kind of experience.
StarSpirit: I’m a woman from Arizona. I started stumbling in January of 2005.
GSSPP5: I am a 25 year old guy. I am into sports, movies, etc. I also want to know everything and I get bored very easily.
MB: What got you involved in StumbleUpon in the first place?
SS: One of my favorite blogs went on vacation and left a comment page open, and somebody mentioned Stumbleupon. I had a science and a art blog myself which I soon dumped after joining StumbleUpon, which I found easier, more fun, and friendlier.
GS: I got involved in stumbleupon through a buddy of mine. It wound up working out well. It generally only sends me “good” sites and it allows me to forward most of the sites that I like to friends who are working.
RC: My Video Map was submitted by StumbleUpon user “ChaseLightning”. Never heard of SU until then (June 06). Signed up, started another blog that corresponds with my StumbleUpon blog, which is virtualmagic.blogspot.com. This blog has videos of various topics of interest. My StumbleUpon blog leads visitors to each “video topic” on Virtual Magic. I’ve also blended in two other blogs, comprisal.blogspot.com and blendedexposures.blogspot.com. All three blogs are integrated with each other so the user does not feel he/she is leaving the site. This was due to the fact of the homepage on Virtual Magic becoming too large. My StumbleUpon blog was not always this way though. I started off photoblogging like most users.
MB: How did you get into the top Stumbler position? Did you actively try to get there, or did it just happen?
GS: I did not know I was a top stumbler until you told me so I guess it just happened.
RC: I am not sure how StumbleUpon determines their “Top Stumblers”. Basically, I was just browsing that page one day and saw myself listed, so it just happened. I do believe, however, that one thing I have started doing more often just since I got to be a “Top Stumbler” is stumbling and thumbing up my friends pages. This must be important.
MB: StumbleUpon has a lot of different features and aspects to it. Which features do you like best, and which things annoy you the most?
RC: I like most of the features I guess or I wouldn’t use it as often as I do. I think the search tool is probably underutilized my most people. Lately, I’ve found myself searching SU instead of Google because of ALL the spam web pages on Google.SS: I like the comments, sometimes they’re hilarious, and I like to see who visits. (I wish they would expand that because I miss some sometimes). The stumble video is very annoying.
GS: I like the way it allows me to email directly from the page I am on. What irks me to no end is that every couple of days I have to reenter the email addresses I send to.
RC: Which things annoy me the most? The 200 friend limit. Why not just have fans or no limit at all. Makes no sense to LIMIT friends. This is an annoying feature and I hope SU will do something about it soon. And what is the “Audience”? Does anybody ‘really’ know? What also annoys me is not knowing how it is determined what submissions are shown to others right off the bat after submitting them. I’ve submitted some pages, and they are NEVER stumbled by one person. I know not all of my submissions are going to go viral on SU, but how is it determined that NO ONE views a submitted webpage? Does SU management filter submissions???
MB: The social aspect of SU is something that isn’t necessary, but is an interesting feature. How much time do you spend interacting in the StumbleUpon community?
RC: I spend 0% of my time associating with the StumbleUpon Community. Besides thumbing up their blogs I like and maybe adding a friend here and there, little or no regular communication is going on. It is very nice to receive comments, though I rarely comment on others SU blogs. I am happy to thumb up any SU blog though.
GS: None.
SS: It ‘IS’ necessary. It all depends - I have spent several hours cowriting poetry, joking around, or arguing about the latest issues, but usually a half hour a day in email. I spend more time on IM with fellow Stumblers than email.
MB: Free write time - anything else you’d like to say about anything?
RC: Thanks to the regular readers. Thanks to for the nice and encouraging comments.SS: I think drugs should be legalized and anybody in prison or jail for simple posession should be released.
I think the top ten polluters in the world should be closed down every month till they get there act together with help from all the scientific communities and a paypal fund.
I think birthmarks are a result/scar from the sperm entering the egg.
And, even though the founders of stumbleupon are very handsome, I’m WAY cuter.
Thanks for all of the great responses! Happy Stumbling!
If you’re interested in more info about StumbleUpon, check out the StumbleUpon Resource List or the other articles written during StumbleUpon Week.
