StumbleUpon for Android updates, adds Beam
The new StumbleUpon app for Android shows off new features, a polished interface, and NFC capability.
Apparently, new phones, tablets, and other hardware aren't making the only news coming out of Barcelona, Spain, this week, as popular social discovery engine StumbleUpon has just released its newest Android app.
A featured developer at the Google Android booth, StumbleUpon got to show off its updated Android app as well as its new logo and color scheme at Mobile World Congress.
If you're not familiar with StumbleUpon, it's basically a Web site that helps you discover new Web sites. It gets to know you through your profile and your Web browsing activity, then uses the data it gathers to recommend other sites for you to visit. And it works fantastically, I might add, whether you're using it on your desktop browser, phone, or tablet.
In the updated Android app, StumbleUpon has clearly gone to great lengths to make the stumbling experience even simpler for its users. First, the Home screen shows off more visually appealing thumbnails for each category. You can either tap one or swipe right to begin stumbling. There's also an Explore box where you can type in an interest in order to experience more targeted stumbling.
As one would expect, the new StumbleUpon app also takes advantage of features specific to Android Ice Cream Sandwich. It employs the Action Bar, offers a resizable Home Screen widget, and can now share via Google+.
But the biggest addition to the StumbleUpon app is undoubtedly its Android Beam support, which makes it easy to share items with other NFC-enabled phones running Ice Cream Sandwich. As we all know, there aren't very many of these devices in the wild yet, but it's still an exciting feature nonetheless.
And, finally, now you can log in to StumbleUpon using your Google Account, whereas previously the app only supported Facebook log-in. Interestingly, though, the Google Sign In button still hasn't been added to the StumbleUpon Web site, but we're expecting it to pop up any day now.
The newly updated StumbleUpon for Android (download) is available for free download now in the Android Market.