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Welcome to
to the October 2007 issue of
ZooNews, from professional
Web site design company Zoonini
Web Services.
What you may not know about me is that:
- I
- Love
- Lists
I once made an autobiographical video self-portrait
about my affliction called Listoholic. But that was
back in the pre-Web era. Today there's a new generation of
online list-making tools available to feed my addiction – ahem – I
mean, to make me more productive. Here are a couple of them:
Todoist – my
latest discovery is a free online service (upgrades are available
for a small monthly fee) that allows me to organize all my
lists in one place. I have lists for sites in development,
maintenance work for existing clients, new projects, administration
tasks, server-management chores and more. I can colour-code
projects, assign priorities, reorder the list, assign labels,
and set a date and time for any item so I can see what's
coming up today, tomorrow, or within 7 days. There's even
a free tool to download a backup of my lists from the Todoist
Web server. It can also integrate with Gmail, as well as
applications like QuickSilver, Launchy and Dashboard. So
far I'm loving it and it's definitely boosted my productivity.
PocketMod – For those
who still prefer paper lists (or like me, a combination of
online and paper) this ingenious Flash-based tool allows
the easy creation of little booklets – all concocted
from a single piece of paper. It's a great way to use up
scrap, because only one side of the sheet is used to print
out plain lines, checkboxes, accounting tallies and calendars
of all types. Even music staff sheets, blank storyboard panels,
food diaries, or SuDoku games can be added. Just click on
whatever you'd like to be printed on each of 6 small pages,
drag it over to the PocketMod-o-matic, and click a button
to send the results to your printer. Easy, fun, and addictive.
37 Signals is
a commercial software company providing a range of online
organizing tools. From the relatively simple, like all-around
personal list-management service Backpack,
to the powerful – collaborative
project-management system Basecamp – to
something in between, contact-manager Highrise.
Each is available in several incarnations, with free
and trial versions offered. Although I haven't yet tried their
services myself, several colleagues vouch for their ease of
use.
 Task-list managers like those above can be considered
a type of life
hack – a tool or trick to help lead a more productive
life. According to Wikipedia, "anything
that solves an everyday problem in a clever or non-obvious
way might be called a life hack. The term became popularized
in the blogosphere and is primarily used by geeks who suffer
from information overload or those with a playful curiosity
in the ways they can accelerate their workflow." Two life-hack
repositories to check out: 43
Folders and Lifehacker.com.
Got a technology term you'd like
demystified in ZooNews?
Send it to questions@zoonini.com.
We are thrilled to announce the site
remake launch of
Montreal-based film producers Picture
This Productions.
The project brings Zoonini full circle, as the original
incarnation of PictureThis.ca was one of the first sites
we ever built, back in 1999. The new site features a wealth
of information about Picture This's documentary,
fiction and corporate video services, optimized by A.C.
Riley Communications. Purchase of the company's films
is made easy with an online shopping cart, and samples
of their corporate-video work are available for viewing
right on the site, which features graphic design and Flash
animation from Picture This logo designer
Momunit and their partner It's
Derivative.
Got any domain names you don't need any more? You could
be sitting on a gold mine! You may have heard that Computer.com sold at auction earlier this month for $2.2 million dollars.
Meanwhile, WallStreet.com didn't reach the sellers' reserve
price of $4-5 million, with the highest offer coming in at
only a piddly $3 mil. Meanwhile, this year's record price
for a domain name still holds at $9.5 million. What domain
reaped that bonanza for its owner? Why, Porn.com, of course.
À la prochaine,
kp
aka Kathryn Presner |
