We’ve discussed the attraction of using paper planners in the past. Even though web workers have access to all sorts of cool to-do list and other planning applications on the web, there are times when getting everything down on paper is the best way to keep […] Read more »
We’ve given some advice for setting freelance hourly rates before, including a rough rule of thumb for those leaving more traditional employment (multiple your hourly pay as an employee by 2.5 to 3.0). But a new blog post from Pat Allan offers another way to think […] Read more »
I’m planning to have a good 2009 – and this is going to be the year that I actually plan that. I’ve managed to muddle through the past couple of years of web working without any major plans, but like many of you, the economy has […] Read more »
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2008 is almost gone, and for most of us, this is a slack week at work – whether we’re self-employed or working for someone else (you may even be on voluntary or enforced vacation in the latter case). Traditionally, that makes it a good time for […] Read more »
A while back we looked at Blogo, a unified blogging and microblogging client. Now they’ve put out version 1.2, which extends Blogo to support new targets and adds some useful options as well. If you’re an OS X user who posts online frequently, it’s worth a […] Read more »
We’ve looked at note organizer Evernote before, and liked what we saw. Th combination of desktop and web clients, text recognition, and the promise of universal information availability, make it very useful as a general-purpose place to store, well, everything. A new feature, introduced just in […] Read more »
There’s been a lot of talk about what Twitter’s own monetization model will turn out to be – even though Twitter itself has been mum on the subject beyond saying that they do have a plan. But meanwhile, some of the communities on Twitter have taken […] Read more »
There are a large number of project management applications and service out there; we’ve looked at many of them in the past. Most of them are explicitly directed at coordinating a team working on projects for a client, and are a poor fit for a single […] Read more »
The end of the calendar year is fast approaching, the days are short, and it seems a natural time to look back – and forward. As a web worker, I try to take stock of how I’m doing at least once a year, and think about […] Read more »
There are plenty of time-tracking applications out there; we’ve reviewed more than a few over the years. But that doesn’t mean that there’s no innovation left in the field. Case in point: BubbleTimer, which wants to make tracking your time into an effective time-management tool rather […] Read more »
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If you’re like most web workers, Google is pretty pervasive in your online life. But how about your physical life – you know, the one full of atoms rather than bits? Well, if you’d like a little bit of Google to stick on your laptop or […] Read more »
Remember the good old days when all you had to worry about was .com? (Well, and .org, .net, and .edu for special cases). Long gone, of course. Today a new top-level domain, .tel, is opening up for sale. The launch is being run by Telnic, though […] Read more »
As we covered last week, free services I Want Sandy and Stikkit are closing shortly, joining a growing list of Web 2.0 free-to-consumer startups that have shuttered their sites. It’s not just the little guys that are going out of business, either: Google Lively is set […] Read more »
We’re written about Tactile CRM a couple of times in the past – they’re an excellent choice in the starter CRM market, for people who need some sort of customer relations management product but who don’t want to be overwhelmed by complexity. Now they’re released version […] Read more »
We’ve looked at freelance outsourcing and crowdsourcing sites in the past – places like 99 Designs for graphics work or Elance for programming and other fields. Generally speaking, it seems that most web workers in our audience view these sites as a threat, encouraging rate cutting […] Read more »
The annual Thanksgiving holiday in the US is coming up next week – and a lot of web workers are preparing to take some downtime away from their computers as a result. Before you go, though, why not take a few minutes to participate in our […] Read more »
A new service built on top of Twitter by a third party, Twitpay is interesting both in its own right and as an example of the way the Twitter ecosystem continues to grow. You may remember a number of attempts to launch micropayment services a few […] Read more »
As a web worker who cares about your career, it’s just plain good sense to do what you can to make sure that your income survives increased competition. Fortunately, WWD has offered plenty of advice on that score over the years. Here are an even dozen of our best articles and tips for supercharging your career. Read more »
I’ve run across yet another survey that claims to demonstrate “small businesses are rapidly cutting overhead costs to adjust to the new reality of a slowing economy.” Among other findings in this survey: 75% of small businesses negatively impacted by the current economy 72% are reducing […] Read more »
The addition of Gmail Voice and Video Chat to Google’s list of services brought back to mind a question I’ve been thinking about for a while: have we gone past the saturation point in having different ways to chat with people? Even if you count only […] Read more »
There’s a new application in town for those who want a simple approach to maintaining their appointments: Deadline. They boast of being “the simplest calendar ever made,” though a variety of features are already in place or being planned. After signing up for a free account, […] Read more »
If you’re a web worker, you likely spend plenty of time using Google (unless you’re one of those folks is concerned about their continued strides towards world domination). And judging by the numbers we’ve seen, you probably use Firefox as well. If that’s your combination of […] Read more »
You can probably already think of a bunch of different ways to collaborate with your web-working co-workers on editing a piece of text: emailing drafts, wikis, instant messages, online word processors like Google Documents or Zoho Writer. DoingText is a new entrant in this crowded field, […] Read more »
Everyone (at least, everyone in our corner of the world) knows about Twitter. But have you ever thought about the possibilities of setting up something Twitter-like on your own intranet? If so, you’re not alone. That’s one of the basic messages of a new comparison of […] Read more »
As a web worker, I find myself involved in a lot of online conversations – I mean, a lot. As I write this, for example, I have four instant messenger windows open to people on various services, I’m hanging out in 3 Campfire rooms and 3 […] Read more »
As a developer and some-time designer, I’m always on the lookout for tools to make communicating with customers easier. For many things, the textual tools that web workers reach for are sufficient: email, wikis, project management systems, instant messages, and so on. But sometimes you just […] Read more »
There’s never a shortage of applications to track your task list, from online choices like Remember the Milk to full-blown GTD applications like OmniFocus and Things to simple lists like Today or the built-in tasks in Mail.app on OS X. Lately, though, I’ve found myself looking […] Read more »
As web workers, of course, we get plenty of our news from the web. And there are those electronic media out there as well. And yet…I can’t help thinking of all the ways that printed information from periodicals has been useful in my own career. Read more »
We’ve looked at a couple of utilities designed to help teams spread across timezones stay on track, including the FoxClocks addon to Firefox and the EasyTZ site. A new approach, Permatime, offers a new way to check what time it is everywhere – and to represent […] Read more »
We’ve written before about the importance of personal branding to freelance web workers. In these times of economic uncertainty, though, it’s a subject that’s worth revisiting. We’d all like to think that the jobs go to us because we’re the best in our fields – but […] Read more »
The Firefox 3 “awesome bar” generally does a good job of finding the web page you want when you start typing into it. With its ability to look into your history, go to a URL, or trigger a search of the web, it offers multiple avenues to get to where you want to go. But it can still be improved. If you find yourself navigating around the web on a frequent basis (and what web worker doesn’t?) here are a selection of ways to supercharge your searching. Read more »
We recently looked at the question of what people pay for web applications. Some of us put a fairly substantial sum into monthly payments for online functionality – which, if your billing rates are decent, is easy to justify in the name of time saving. But […] Read more »
A press release that Nokia sent out overnight caught my eye: More than half of working Americans – 53 percent – have been interrupted by a work-related phone call or email while in the bathroom…. Twenty-four percent have allowed a call or email to interrupt them […] Read more »
One of the fancy terms that gets thrown around in Web 2.0 discussions is “disintermediation” – in other words, cutting out the middleman. Authonomy is a new site from Harper Collins that aims to do just that in the world of book publishing. If you’re a […] Read more »
Well, even if cell phones won’t fry your brain like popcorn, there’s something new to worry about: “mobile phone dermatitis.” According to the British Association of Dermatologists, as reported by Reuters, there’s enough nickel in many popular mobile devices to cause a reaction in sensitive users. […] Read more »
Many web workers have a need to track expenses – either for client or employer reimbursement, or just to get their taxes right. And most of us have developed some solution for that – sticky notes, spreadsheets, notebooks, and so on. Of course, like just about […] Read more »
When we asked whether you’d find a $899 MacBook tempting, a lot of you said “yes.” Alas, it turns out that the rumors of a seriously sub-$100 notebook from Apple were dead wrong. Steve Jobs did announce a $899 product at today’s press event – but […] Read more »
In advance of tomorrow’s Apple media event, rumors are swirling about a sub-$1000 laptop – with most sources pegging it at an $800 or $900 price point. This would be a $200 to $300 drop from the current cheapest MacBook – but perhaps more importantly, it would also be the first time for an Apple laptop to break into a 3-digit price. Read more »
Even the most devoted of web workers sometimes resorts to printing things out on bits of dead trees, in my experience. Maybe it’s the setup information for a new account or the instructions for some software or even your favorite LOLcat – sooner or later you’ll […] Read more »
Mozy, one of our favorite online backup services, continues to expand into new niches. This time around they have their focus on Mac-heavy networks. Specifically, they’re adding MozyPro for Mac to their existing lineup of MozyHome for PC or Mac and MozyPro for PC. The idea […] Read more »
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