Compare the features and functionality of Delicious and StumbleUpon and discuss.
Both Delicious and StumbleUpon allow users to organize, share, and discover web pages. In addition, StumbleUpon serves as a personalized recommendation engine which recommends web pages based on personal preferences (user can choose from nearly 500 interest categories) as well as user ratings. It presents web pages when users click on the Stumble Button and users can rate them by giving a thumbs-up or thumbs-down. StumbleUpon users can also write reviews of web pages and share them with others, a feature which is not available through Delicious.
Tagging—A big strength of Delicious compared to StumbleUpon is its tagging functionality. As mentioned in this week’s lecture, Delicious users can organize their tags into hierarchical tag bundles or folders. StumbleUpon doesn’t provide this feature. Delicious also displays tags more prominently right next to the title of a bookmark. With StumbleUpon, users need to click on the Reviews link first in order to be able to view the tags. If there is no review available, no tags will be available either. In addition, Delicious users generally seem to make better use of the tagging functionality as many bookmarks are tagged with multiple tags. Most StumbleUpon bookmarks have only one tag and tags are often broad subject areas, such as Fine Arts or Sports. My personal impression is that most StumbleUpon users use the service primarily for its recommendation function rather than as a tool for organizing web content.
RSS Feeds—Delicious offers a large variety of RSS feeds, including recent bookmarks by tag, most popular bookmarks, or bookmarks for a specific user by tag. Users can also subscribe to tags by adding them to their subscriptions folder. StumbleUpon doesn’t seem to have any options for RSS feeds, or at least I wasn’t able to find them anywhere on the web site.
Toolbar—Both services offer easy-to-use toolbars. The Delicious toolbar has three buttons “Delicious Home,” “Bookmarks,” and “Tag.” Tagging is simple. When clicking on the Tag Button, a window pops up that allows user to enter tags, edit the title of the page, write a note, and save it to the bookmarks. The StumbleUpon toolbar offers some additional features. Besides the Stumble and Thumbs-up and Thumbs-down button users can share a page via email or edit their personal interests. A click on the Thumbs-up button automatically saves a site to the favorites. Users can also bookmark a page not recommended by StumbleUpon by clicking the Thumbs-up Button. A window will pop up that allows users to enter a page title, review, topic, tags, language of the page, as well as whether or not it is adult content.
Social Networking—Both services allow users to subscribe to other users, create a network of friends, and send and receive personal messages. In addition, StumbleUpon users can form discussion groups with friends and like-minded people.
User Profiles—StumbleUpon users can customize their About Me pages with themes, photos, and other features which makes them look more interesting and encourages interaction among users. Delicious displays only some basic user profile information.
In summary, the strength of StumbleUpon is in its recommendation and review features as well as in its community building features (discussion groups, commenting on others reviews, personalized user profiles, etc.). Due to the innovative Stumble technology, StumbleUpon also has a higher entertainment factor than Delicious. Delicious, on the other hand, provides much better features for organizing web content and staying current on topics, such bundling and RSS feeds, which, I believe, makes the service more suitable for meeting the professional needs of librarians and information professionals.
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I'm repeating what others have stated, but I wanted to reiterate the thanks for the great review. I agree completely that Delicious seems to be the more functional app in terms being able to conduct research and keep your bookmarks organized. I discovered Stumble Upon a few months ago and really enjoy its recommendations--they're often obscure sites that are legitimately entertaining. But you're right that the SU tagging feature leaves something to be desired. SU is fun, but doesn't really provide what is needed in a professional setting.
This is a very helpful review. Is it also the case with SU that you are bookmarking (and SU is recommending) sites, while with del.icio.us the user can bookmark pages?
Great comparison, thanks. I got sidetracked for the last 20 minutes looking at stumbleupon after reading your post. What I like about it is that it's so image driven, it's easy to browse and explore with very little effort. In the end though, I don't think I wold use it any further than just killing a little time here and there, due to the nature of the content and it's design. I like the simplicity of delicious, it seems to be a more "serious" site (as I think someone else put it) and more useful over the long term.
It's funny though, someone asked me just the other day if I ever used stumbleupon in response to a facebook post about powerpoint (of all things) and I didn't really know what it was (though I'd heard of it and had a vague idea). So it's good to know a little more about it.
Another site that is similar, and I discovered a few weeks ago (and read about it this week) is ffffound. They've got great stuff there and it's just as easy to kill time as it is on stumbleupon. I'd rate it in between the two sites I think, in terms of usability. Unfortunately it's by invite only, so you can only look unless you are lucky enough to have been invited early on.
It also goes to show that flash doesn't always make for a useful resource. Delicious may have learned from Google - keep things simple and you'll go far.
Great and very helpful review! I had wanted to look at both, but was pressed for time and kept with my Del.icio.us account. I had a sense from the lecture and reading that StumbleUpon was great for the social bookmark browser, whereas the serious bookmarker (ie: for work & research) would do better with Delicious. Your review confirmed this for me. Both address their own niches. I now know I can forego StumbleUpon, as I use my bookmarks almost exclusively for work and research and need organization and sorting over browsing and socializing.
Nice job on comparing the two SB sites. It seems that Delicious has less frills and focuses on sensibility and ease-of-use. While Stumble looks prettier and features more images and eye candy. I prefer Delicious for its basic and easy interface. Since I have so many social networking sites already, I am not really looking for another place to put my photo and hobbies, I just need a SB site for bookmark organization and harvesting new and interesting sites. Thanks for your informative and comprehensive post.