The StumbleUpon phenomenon is often hard to figure out - but when something I've written catches the eye of a group on StumbleUpon, it's always good for a quick rush of visitors who disappear, seemingly as quickly as they had arrived. They aren't the type to leave comments, or even, in most cases, click around and read the rest of the site, but it's good for an hour or so's worth of entertainment - as I try to decipher what it was about that particular item that set them off.
Typically, the story I've written which gets nominated to StumbleUpon isn't even new. For example, today, just after 7:30 (Pacific), I got hit with the latest wave of Stumblers, looking at a series of Alexa charts I posted last Sunday, showing the declining level of influence from traditional media sites in relation to new media.
It's not the first time I'd hit StumbleUpon, having previously reached the site for my comments on Facebook, and one or two others, which I can't recall. But as I've noted before, I shouldn't count on them with any routine. They're one night stands at best.
Speaking of external linkage, Lance Wiggs wrote up a nice piece on why he believes "old media is not doomed" after all. In his mind, it comes down to brands, skills and lawyers.
Also, our good friend and curmudgeon Steven Hodson complains that the latest discussion of Google Reader statistics is just another way for the A-List bloggers to show how much better they are than the rest of us. See his note: I thought they said the A-List wasn’t important; or didn’t exist.
Truth be told, if I had tens of thousands of subscribers, I'd want to count them all the time and show everybody how far ahead I was too... Maybe if I can figure out the magic to getting on StumbleUpon more regularly, I'll get on that list...