If you've noticed that all your friends and colleagues have bloodshot eyes and keep nodding off in the middle of your conversations, don't worry: Chances are, they haven't been out crawling pubs with Amy Winehouse. They've probably just caught the Stumbling bug.

We should know – we've come down with the addiction ourselves, and are finding it very tough to break away from StumbleUpon's intoxicating spell. If you don't know how this incredible web application works already, here's a quick intro – but if you suddenly find yourself Stumbling through the Internet until daybreak, don't say we didn't warn you.

StumbleUpon isn't a website, per se – it's really a whole new way of looking at the web, with more than 4 million helpful guides to lead you to the best stuff around. To use StumbleUpon, you'll first want to download the toolbar application for easy navigation around the Internet. Then, fill in their form with your interests, which could include anything from coffee to Shakespeare to anti-aging – whatever floats your boat.

Next comes the coolest part: finding yourself some friends. This isn't like MySpace, where you'll feel compelled to track down that creepy nose-picking kid from your third grade class, just to have another name on your friends list. Though you can add your actual friends if you like, most of the "friends" you'll meet here are simply people who like the same stuff you like, and have discovered great content around the web that they'd like to share with you.

Take some time to browse the world of Stumblers – meet Persiana, an Iranian woman who posts all sorts of fascinating links to Iranian arts, culture, and photography on her blog. Want to be an eco-warrior? Check out Burkinaboy's great page for links to all things green. Passionate about art and photography? Visit funkytown-art's beautiful blog. And, of course, if you love Gimundo, feel free to check out our (completely unofficial) StumbleUpon page.

Once you've found a few like-minded souls, just add them to your friends list – you don't even need to say hello unless you want to. It just means that you'll have the chance to see all the stuff they loved when you start checking out sites.

Finally, it's time to start Stumbling: Just click the "stumble" icon in the StumbleUpon toolbar, and the application will find a web page customized to fit the interests you selected earlier. It could be a page that one of your friends recommended, or maybe something passed along by a stranger. If you like it and want to recommend it to others, click on the "thumbs up" icon. If it's not your style, thumb it down. It's web-surfing, Roger Ebert-style.

We would go on (and on and on), but our fingers are itching to hit that Stumble button some more, so we'll make this the end of our little primer – for more tips and advice, visit StumbleUpon's comprehensive help page.

Happy stumbling – and we hope you get some sleep tonight!


Original story by Kathryn Hawkins


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