5ThirtyOne

How often can you log into the social networking service Facebook and [honestly] admit that you are doing some type of "productive work"? There is no shame in admitting that a majority of time spent signed into Facebook has off-hour social motives:

• Where and at what time are we meeting for Happy Hour?
• Did you post the photos from last weekends BBQ?
• Joanne SuperPoked you, poke her back!

Facebook isn’t always fun, drinks, and after-the-fact sober did I really do that’s. More mature [serious] activity on Facebook can be found by browsing noteworthy causes, awareness groups, or online political campaigns. Facebook Groups and Applications have matured to embrace every facet of a users in-person and online life with the exception of bridging the fun & games with "simple" projects and really simple collaboration.

A tool set combination not offered by Facebook

How do you organize everything you need to move in with new roomates, plan a trip for Summer break, or throw a surprise birthday party with friends on Facebook? Using the Facebook Events or Groups tool, your options are limited to:

• Event Info: Name, Tagline, Host, and Type
• Time, place, and location
• Contact tracking - who is showing up (RSVP)
• Interaction: Posts, Videos, Photos, and Wall (messaging)
• Discussions

Great basic features that allow you to plan, invite, and broadcast an event. But beyond getting this event out into the public, how do you manage the minor details? How do you get Sylvia to bring the deviled eggs, Marise the party favors, and Marisa the water balloons and squirt guns for the BBQ in two weeks? You could use Facebook Events and include all that info in the description, but the small important details are easily overlooked.

Your Graduation, party, BBQ, Summer trip, and everything in between

Go ahead, keep browsing Facebook profiles. It’s OK. With the Get Stuff Done application, you can justify your long sessions with "but I’m working / organizing / planning something". Go beyond the basic Event and really Get Stuff Done.

Get Stuff Done lets you have fun doing things with people in your network. For anything you want to get done together, you can easily create a space to share files, create lists, assign to-dos, post messages, and see what happened while you were offline. It lets you go beyond group formation, and actually lets you do stuff together.

Why not leverage an existing network that most of your friends spend their day on to coordinate and work together on birthday plans, Graduation celebration, Summer trip, or a school or office project?

Simple

Get Stuff Done offers a set of simple tools in a single interface to easily create and manage projects without becoming overwhelmed. Install the application and begin by creating your own generic project, or elect to choose one of many pre-populated projects like a bachelor / bachelorette party, birthday celebration, group event / activity, or group vacation.

A familiar Activity Feed consolidates all project activity including task tracking, new file uploads, inclusion of new members, and comments. In addition to notifying members here, updates are pushed to your public network (controlled by permissions) and via email.

A feature rich To-Do list allows you to create tasks for yourself or to assign to everyone / others with robust details like a start date, due date, and comments. Even if a task is not assigned to you, you can add your own comments. You know, just in case someone else is assigned with the task of picking up drinks, you can leave your requests in the task comments.

Planning on moving with some roommates? Collect your apartment hunt photographs, consolidated rent Excel sheets, and renters agreements documents in a single, easy to access repository. Shared Files can help. Upload any file you deem worthy of sharing with your project team and add comments when necessary. Movies, music, Excel, Word, and PowerPoint presentations. 10 MB / file limit, 10 files per upload. At this time, files can only be uploaded or downloaded - no online playback or viewing.

Continue working together directly from your personal profile. Visitors will see what you’re working on, and are welcome to contribute (if the project is public), or request an invite (if the project is invite only). Additional project updates - newly created, newly invited, the creation of tasks, completion of tasks, comments, and file uploads - are pushed to the Facebook News Feed, your mini-feed, and your email inbox.

Try it out and share your thoughts

I invite you to join me on Facebook and to check out the Get Stuff Done Application. Try it out and see if the application offers you and your network the right [simple] tools to work together through Facebook. Get Stuff Done is considered an early beta. Note: I did contribute to the Get Stuff Done project.

How do you use Facebook? Do you think simple productivity tools will gain significant traction? Are you open to collaborating via applications like Get Stuff Done on Facebook, or is the service strictly for play? [Digg this]