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Long gone are the times when I would get impressed at StumbleUpon traffic. Of course, for a beginner those huge hit waves would inevitably look very exciting and encouraging. But as time goes by and you have more articles stumbled, you tend to get used to the traffic spikes. You also learn to set your expectations in a more realistic level.

Is StumbleUpon traffic good? You bet it is and you can be sure I won’t reject it. But exactly how good is it? It depends on your aims.

If you want to develop a loyal readership and increase your subscriber base, maybe StumbleUpon won’t help you that much. Of course this comment is mainly based on my own experience. I’ve noticed that stumblers will only return to my blogs if I have new posts stumbled. Otherwise, they will read one article, (hopefully) like it and then forget it. And no, they won’t subscribe. I’ve seen other bloggers reporting similar experiences, so perhaps it’s not just me.

On the other hand, StumbleUpon is great to help you fight that kind of loneliness that torments so many webmasters when they realise that their stats are a bit too static, if you know what I mean. A decent article or a good image will do wonders for your ego when they are discovered by stumblers. I’d say that for non-commercial sites StumbleUpon is definitely the way to go.

One thing that has been disturbing me a bit lately is the increasing radicalism of certain stumblers. They often talk about preserving the “purity” of StumbleUpon. By their standards, if your site is remotely associated to topics like webmastering, blogging, marketing or SEO, you are just like Satan, or Bin Laden, or Pol Pot, or *fill in with your favourite villain*. Therefore, they feel entitled to attack and stalk you. That’s really disgusting. They act as if they were the site’s owners and want to impose their views over the whole community. They just won’t tolerate anyone who dares to disagree with them. You certainly don’t want to meet those types, because they will make sure to spoil your fun.

Another thing that disturbs me somehow is the kind of material certain people stumble. Obviously, one has the right to vote for anything he/she wants as long as it doesn’t infringe the site’s rules. But what amazes me is the fact that some gentlemen and ladies usually pretend to be lovely people and then stumble articles that contradict all their lessons about being nice to your fellows. As you can see, here is another use for StumbleUpon: measuring the sincerity of the people you deal with.