Stumbles for the Week of November 12, 2006

I joined StumbleUpon on April 10, 2005. For awhile, I used it heavily, and then my use tapered off. With its membership growing and my interest in social media becoming more and more defined and apparent, and with new incredibly interesting websites being added, I’ve been using it a lot more lately.

We could always write about the same old news and the same old stuff, but we can also deviate and expound upon those networks upon which we partake and the findings therein. It is nice to write about Digg, but it’s even better to write about your findings within Digg. It is nice to find a useful bookmark on del.icio.us, but it’s much more desirable when you actually share your findings with others. That is the power of social networking, especially when you use your blog to market these sites too. (I’m sure the owners also appreciate that traffic is driven to them by other means!)

With that, I intend to feature a weekly stumbles section where I can share websites that I feel are interesting — and why.

This week’s stumbles follow. If you like them, StumbleUpon them yourself or add them to your favorite social bookmarking sites. There are truly a lot of gems when community effort is involved, and StumbleUpon definitely succeeds at this. Speaking of which, you can always add me as your friend.

• Guess the Logo: We all know of the importance of branding, but do we actually remember the logos on certain famous brands? Do we know where the colors go, or where the special symbols are located? This timed quiz tests you on just that, and interestingly enough, most people don’t score so high on the charts.
• Instant Domain Search: An immediate suggest-as-you-go domain search engine.
• Slow motion video sequence of a balloon being burst: Very cool for science-minded folks.
• Flickr Gallery of Transparent Screens: I love Flickr API applications, and this slideshow is no exception.
• Funny Farm: This word-association game kept me very busy for quite awhile. (Don’t worry if you have cookies; it will store your session on your computer so that you can return to it at a later time!)