# Help the ancient techno-peasant understand these new-fangled doohickies at the bottom of the pages **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [May 4, 2011, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684 "2011-05-04T13:11:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/1 "2011-05-04T13:11:09Z")
The ancient techno-peasant would be me, of course. So, at the bottom of thread pages now, there’s four new icons: Digg [del.icio.us](http://del.icio.us) StumbleUpon Google What do they do? why are they there? ---
**Author:** ![groman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/73ab20/32.png) [@groman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/groman)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 1:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/2 "2011-05-04T13:16:33Z")
[del.icio.us](http://del.icio.us) and google links are the links to bookmark this page in [del.icio.us](http://del.icio.us) or google’s online bookmarking system respectively. the digg and stumbleupon linsk are the links to submit this thread to digg and/or stumbleupon respectively. ---
**Author:** ![Rhythmdvl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/85f322/32.png) [@Rhythmdvl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rhythmdvl)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/3 "2011-05-04T13:24:19Z")
Any way to get rid of them (I don’t use them and it would cut down on visual clutter)? Are they _anything_ more than iconed links? Or do they also run code in the background collecting (anonymous or not) data on read threads? ETA: Looking at NoScript, it’s currently blocking: Rubiconproject Excelator Cdnlayer Quantserve Are any of these related? What do they want to run/do? (Should this be in ATMB?) ---
**Author:** ![BrotherCadfael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@BrotherCadfael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrotherCadfael)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/4 "2011-05-04T13:37:47Z")
> [@groman](#): > > [del.icio.us](http://del.icio.us) and google links are the links to bookmark this page in [del.icio.us](http://del.icio.us) or google’s online bookmarking system respectively. > > the digg and stumbleupon linsk are the links to submit this thread to digg and/or stumbleupon respectively. Well, THAT tells us a whole lot. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![UncleRojelio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/unclerojelio/32/3160_2.png) [@UncleRojelio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleRojelio)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/5 "2011-05-04T13:59:44Z")
Oh fer chrissakes … > **[Digg](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digg)** > > Digg, stylized in lowercase as digg, is an American news aggregator with a curated front page, aiming to select stories specifically for the Internet audience such as science, trending political issues, and viral Internet issues. It was launched in its current form on July 31, 2012, with support for sharing content to other social platforms such as Twitter and Facebook. > It formerly had been a popular social news website, allowing people to vote web content up or down, called digging and burying,... > **[Delicious (website)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delicious_%28website%29)** > > Delicious (stylized del.icio.us) was a social bookmarking web service for storing, sharing, and discovering web bookmarks. The site was founded by Joshua Schachter and Peter Gadjokov in 2003 and acquired by Yahoo! in 2005. By the end of 2008, the service claimed more than 5.3 million users and 180 million unique bookmarked URLs. Yahoo sold Delicious to AVOS Systems in April 2011, and the site relaunched in a "back to beta" state on September 27 that year. In May 2014, AVOS sold On June 1, 2017, ... > **[StumbleUpon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/StumbleUpon)** > > StumbleUpon was a browser extension, toolbar, and mobile app with a "Stumble!" button that, when pushed, opened a semi-random website or video that matched the user's interests, similar to a random web search engine. Users were able to filter results by type of content and were able to discuss such webpages via virtual communities and were able to rate such webpages via like buttons. StumbleUpon was shut down in June 2018. > StumbleUpon was founded in November 2001 by Garrett Camp, Geoff Smith, ... ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/6 "2011-05-04T14:29:21Z")
Is [del.icio.us](http://del.icio.us) still popular? I would think that a Facebook link would be more useful to more people. ---
**Author:** ![Rhythmdvl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/85f322/32.png) [@Rhythmdvl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rhythmdvl)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/7 "2011-05-04T14:37:27Z")
BTW, there’s a related discussion in ATMB: [We’ve Added Share Buttons](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=607006) ---
**Author:** ![Rachellelogram](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rachellelogram/32/8689_2.png) [@Rachellelogram](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rachellelogram)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/8 "2011-05-04T15:38:49Z")
You can block them by installing the firefox addon “Remove It Permanently” (aka R.I.P., hehe). You can block ANY content on a webpage, and you can block it for the whole domain. Although adblock is effective at removing ad content, it doesn’t always get rid of the placeholders where the ads used to be. RIP will remove the placeholders, too. For example, ads which I blocked on my gaming forum for a long time still permanently displaced a hundred pixels of valuable screen real estate. I used RIP to take away the blank space. It was good. ---
**Author:** ![purplehorseshoe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/purplehorseshoe/32/2996_2.png) [@purplehorseshoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehorseshoe)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/9 "2011-05-04T16:43:38Z")
> [@Rhythmdvl](#): > > Any way to get rid of them (I don’t use them and it would cut down on visual clutter)? > > Are they _anything_ more than iconed links? Or do they also run code in the background collecting (anonymous or not) data on read threads?.. > > (Should this be in ATMB?) In backwards order: apparently, it already is; not that _I_ know of (looks around suspiciously); not seeing the “clutter” really, as it’s a single line of small icons at the very bottom of the thread, tho ymmv and all that. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/10 "2011-05-04T19:17:10Z")
> [@groman](#): > > [del.icio.us](http://del.icio.us) and google links are the links to bookmark this page in [del.icio.us](http://del.icio.us) or google’s online bookmarking system respectively. > > the digg and stumbleupon linsk are the links to submit this thread to digg and/or stumbleupon respectively. Why would I want to? remember, ancient techno-peasant. ---
**Author:** ![SmithCommaJohn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecd19e/32.png) [@SmithCommaJohn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmithCommaJohn)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/11 "2011-05-04T19:36:52Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > Why would I want to? remember, ancient techno-peasant. Digg is a “social news website.” You submit a news article or webpage that you find interesting, and the community votes on whether they like it or not. The stories that get the most positive response are automatically directed to the top of the front page of [Digg.com](http://Digg.com). Basically, it’s meant to serve as a barometer for what millions of people find interesting at a given moment. StumbleUpon is sort of similar. It’s a service that lets you “channel surf” the internet. You register an account, give a little bit of demographic information, and some information about your interests, and then install the toolbar. Whenever you’re bored, you can click “stumble,” and it will direct you to a random webpage that it think you might like, based on the information you provided. You can then click a “thumbs up” or “thumbs down” button on the toolbar to indicate if you like or dislike what you’ve just seen, so the service can, in theory, direct you to stuff you’re more likely to enjoy. Putting those buttons on a webpage makes it easier for people to submit that page to those services, thereby sharing it with lots of people. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/12 "2011-05-04T22:51:32Z")
Even though the questions are general ones, let’s move from GQ to ATMB, since we’re talking about things having to do with this Board. **samclem** Moderator ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/13 "2011-05-04T23:52:58Z")
My first thread moving! woo-hoo! I roused a moderator to take action! ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/14 "2011-05-04T23:54:15Z")
> [@SmithCommaJohn](#): > > Digg is a “social news website.” You submit a news article or webpage that you find interesting, and the community votes on whether they like it or not. The stories that get the most positive response are automatically directed to the top of the front page of [Digg.com](http://Digg.com). Basically, it’s meant to serve as a barometer for what millions of people find interesting at a given moment. > > StumbleUpon is sort of similar. thank you, **SmithCommaJohn**. Is [del.icio.us](http://del.icio.us) something similar? ---
**Author:** ![tavalla](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tavalla/32/89_2.png) [@tavalla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tavalla)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2011, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/15 "2011-05-05T00:47:16Z")
[del.icio.us](http://del.icio.us) is a bookmarking and sharing service. You can bookmark the sites or items you find interesting; then, when you’re on another computer down the track, you can find it again because it’s on your [del.icio.us](http://del.icio.us) account. You can also share your bookmarks, and it’ll collect the most popular and most recent ones on its pages. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2011, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/16 "2011-05-05T03:30:05Z")
thank you, that’s very helpful. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2011, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/17 "2011-05-05T06:39:24Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > My first thread moving! woo-hoo! I roused a moderator to take action! The stars must be right. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2011, 7:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/18 "2011-05-05T07:14:52Z")
> [@Rhythmdvl](#): > > Looking at NoScript, it’s currently blocking: > Rubiconproject > Excelator > Cdnlayer > Quantserve > > Are any of these related? What do they want to run/do? > > (Should this be in ATMB?) Those were all there before. Also, NoScript has a function where, if you middle click on site, it will take you to a page letting you get info about the site. I use the first link to decide whether I will allow a script to run. Anyways, I’ve done this before and I can tell you about them. [ul] [li]Rubicon is an ad server with dubious privacy and malware records [/li][li]Excelator is a tracker that actually uses a browser exploit to get into your history (upgrade to Firefox 4 or the latest Chrome to fix)[/li][li]Cdnlayer is a content delivery service that forces the cloud to use the closest content, but has a really low rating for some reason[/li][\*]Quantserve is like Google-analytics (which you apparently trust enough to enable), but provides information publicly to advertisers. In this case, it probably sends information about how many people come to this site to Rubicon, so they know how much to pay Ed. It conceivably could also be used by Addthis, the providers of the links.[/ul] ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2011, 7:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/19 "2011-05-05T07:26:01Z")
> [@rachelellogram](#): > > You can block them by installing the firefox addon “Remove It Permanently” (aka R.I.P., hehe). You can block ANY content on a webpage, and you can block it for the whole domain. > > Although adblock is effective at removing ad content, it doesn’t always get rid of the placeholders where the ads used to be. RIP will remove the placeholders, too. For example, ads which I blocked on my gaming forum for a long time still permanently displaced a hundred pixels of valuable screen real estate. I used RIP to take away the blank space. It was good. Adblock can and usually does handle that. If it messes up, just use the Element Hiding helper. That said, the EHH has a problem working on pages like these with very little CSS. Apparently your addon can handle that stuff, as it uses a different underlying engine. Still, I don’t know if I’d rather use it than the EHH. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2011, 7:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684/20 "2011-05-05T07:33:58Z")
NETA: Adblock can and does handle the ads here without placeholders. But the CSS of the links is the same as the actual posts, so I can’t just select the links pane. I’m sure there might be a way to tweak it to working, but why bother when another addon can handle it better? [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-the-ancient-techno-peasant-understand-these-new-fangled-doohickies-at-the-bottom-of-the-pages/580684.md?page=2)