we all lose with the social sharing craze that is littering the web. More clutter, slower loading pages, and gimmicks to get to you upvote a site.
Couldn't agree more. I've made a deliberate effort to not buy into the craze with swombat.com. Anything that can't be restyled as a text link which blends into the no-graphics minimalist style of the site just ain't gonna happen.
One small concession I've made is that I show the reddit upvote widget for people who have come directly via Reddit. Like that's helped me. ;-)