I came across an interesting article about how the medium affects the way the author behaves. As we change modes of transport, communications, language etc. it surely has an effect on our other aspects, our moods, thoughts and attitudes.

I act quite differently in my car than I do when I meet strangers in a store. I’m much more likely to be aggressive while driving, whereas in a store, I’m generally very courteous and tend to go out of my way to hold doors open for people Read More.

Working in social media involves a lot of online interactions and relation building. While I can manage that aspect well, if I was put on a phone call things would become a little difficult. I tend to be curt and snippy even with friends.

Personally when I meet people then again things get simple. Only when on the phone I just want to put it down.

Are you aware of any such behavioral changes in yourself due to medium?

Snaps from the DeskAway post-work cocktail party we had last Friday. We go to a local bar, the team gets to relax and interact informally. A good way to bring in the weekend. Cheers!

See more photos on our flickr..

Just like we add new features every month, we are also keeping an eye on the ones that need to be removed and phased out. This will keep the app fresh and the user experience smooth. These are features that are rarely used or are outdated (and there is an alternative way).  On Tuesday, Dec. 15th we will be phasing out the following small features.

View pending tasks link under Project Tab

We built this about 2 years ago and it still has the old interface. A better way to keep track of your pending tasks would be to either check out the Overdue section on your Dashboard or setup a daily email reminder that will email you your overdue projects/ milestones/ tasks and issues.

Team Departments

This feature just never made it. Even though you make a team department and link up a contact, you really can’t segregate people by departments. We plan to take this up in a more powerful way in 2010. Your contacts that you added to departments will now become your Personal contacts.

Project Listing Page - Pending Links

The separate pending task and issue link at the bottom of the Project (boxed in yellow) will be removed for 2 reasons:

1. Even though it tells you the number of pending tasks it takes you to the Task List page that also can be accessed from the icons on right top corner of the individual project listing (boxed in green).

2. We noticed that fetching this data was slowing down the Project Listing page for people who had a lot of projects (over a hundred in some cases).

Recently came across an article on Venture Beat which analyzes a survey where most businesses have already or are looking to opt for virtual/remote working options in the future.

Just 15 percent of the small- and medium sized businesses we spoke with utilize a traditional office model, where employees work from one central physical location. And 45 percent of survey respondents – including those traditionalists – spend more than three-quarters of their time conducting business out of the office. Read more…

The reasons for this shift towards virtual setups and remote working can easily be pegged at:

• large amount of information storage on the web using SaaS tools, apps and collaborative solutions.

• Business transactions taking place via email, chat, twitter etc..

• Wi-fi internet is accessible almost everywhere in the metro and big cities

• the new smart phones enable people to carry their office in their pockets

Businessmen are now more free with where they do their business. Going for a far off meeting does not mean losing out on the business at office. Inevitably virtual offices are an easy, low cost option.

What are your thoughts? Does your business have a virtual setup?

DeskAway was recently reviewed by 20:20 Social a social business strategy firm based in India. They provide solutions for Indian and international clients.

We found the interface easy to use, clean and inviting. It was easy to get started without really digging deep into the How To tutorial /video and it was nice to see how tips and tutorials were generously placed on various pages but with the option of closing them all in one go in case you felt confident of finding your way around independently.

Always feel that a tabbed view makes an app largely clutter free and easy to navigate and at the same time allows a lot of features to be packaged in well. DeskAway scores high marks on this account and makes good use of a tabbed UI and frames.

Read More.

Thanks Abha and the 20:20 Social team!