The popular web service StumbleUpon rolled out an official app for iPad back in June and has now followed its debut app with StumbleUpon!, a version dedicated to iPhone and iPod Touch users. Anyone who uses StumbleUpon for the web, will find the transition to StumbleUpon! to be seamless, as it pulls in your account information and previously set interest categories. New users will be able to register for an account from the app’s front page — this step is required for mobile access — and will be able to start stumbling within seconds.
Once you’ve got the app going, you’ll see a large button to Start Stumbling!, a section of quick links for good mobile-stumbling sites and a list of your selected topics. Through the top tool bar, users will be able to give a thumbs-up to pages they like or a thumbs-down to pages they don’t — this is an important step as StumbleUpon will learn your preferences to further tailor your experience. To stumble to the next site, tap the SU icon in the upper right corner. Through the lower tool bar, you can move back and forth between sites, share content via email, Facebook or Twitter, or see StumbleUpon stats for the site, including the number of views, Stumblers who liked the page and comments.
Although I found StumbleUpon! to be an adequate app alternative to the real thing, I was disappointed to see there was no ability for users to leave comments on things they stumble. The app defaults to a full-page web view, but this can be changed to thumbnail previews through the Settings panel. Because this is the only changeable setting, I don’t see why it couldn’t have been added to the app itself. Users also cannot open stories in Safari, or save photos. I hope to see this added in a future update.
