TUAW's Daily iPad app: StumbleUpon
If you're familiar with StumbleUpon, the iPad app will be a very comfortable experience. Instead of browsing "stumbled" sites in a browser with a toolbar, the StumbleUpon app allows you to visit sites shared by others (within a couple dozen categories like "tech" or "babes") from your iPad, complete with sharing tools and the ubiquitous "Like" or "Don't Like" buttons for each page you visit.
The StumbleUpon app is nicely designed for the iPad, with all the features you could access in your browser, somewhat more conveniently arranged around the main window where you'll be viewing shared web content. There's not much more to this app, except that I wish StumbleUpon had taken the opportunity to leverage the touchscreen on the iPad. It is handy to have Stumble, Like, share, forward/back buttons around your viewing area, but there's no real innovation in the app.
There are glimmers of hope, as the Home screen actually has a swipe-able list of your interests (which you can edit). But it would have been nice to see this put into my history, so I could easily see previous "liked" content. Or perhaps a grid of suggestions grouped by interest, so I'm not passing through a bunch of "comedy movie" stumbles before getting to a "tech" page. Still, your profile screen offers a list of your likes, and how many people you are following and how many are following you. This is well-presented, as is the Home screen and your main browsing screen.
Newcomers to StumbleUpon will find it quite easy to get started. While you cannot skip questions about your age and gender, finding others on StumbleUpon is really easy thanks to the app having access to your iPad's address book. Don't worry, this is only to match up email addresses to those already registered with StumbleUpon, and you don't have to choose anyone. Still, I found it was helpful to add a few people so I can see what they are sharing. StumbleUpon is, after all, a crowdsourced service, so the more the merrier.
If anything, the StumbleUpon app suffers from a lack of coherent user interfaces. Still, the basic functionality of finding "cool stuff" by hitting that Stumble button is well-suited to the iPad. You're not going to see Flash content, but in the time I spent using the app I never saw any! If you're prone to clicking that Stumble button in your browser, or if you've never used StumbleUpon before, the iPad app is a great place to go. Within minutes you'll be up and finding all kinds of crazy things.
