Introducing Gootodo, a bit-literate todo list

Oct 4, 2005

I'm happy to announce my latest Goo' app, which I hope will greatly increase personal productivity for thousands, eventually millions, of Internet users: Gootodo.com, a todo list that lets you forward e-mails to future days, so you don't have to deal with them today.

[Updated June 22, 2006: thanks to Seth for the pointer! -mh]

More detail below.

Now, I occasionally write about "bit literacy" - the idea that people should become proficient with managing digital information. Just as they had to learn software in the age of "computer literacy" 20 years ago, knowledge workers must learn how to manage information today, in the age of bits.

A great deal of productivity is at stake. In my experience, bit literate users are several times faster at completing tasks, with fewer errors, better organized in general, and perhaps most importantly, less stressed about their jobs.

One key piece in bit literacy is knowing how to use e-mail. So a couple of years back I wrote a Managing Incoming E-mail report, which has been very popular (and recently covered in this Forbes article [and later in this Chicago Tribune piece]). But while better e-mail practices helped users to some extent, there was always still one missing piece: the todo list.

Today I supply that missing piece.

For years - through many versions of Windows - most computer users have been saddled with the Microsoft Outlook task list, which - to put it generously - didn't get the attention it deserved. In fact, except for one or two niche software apps I've seen over the years, almost no users in the world have a good todo list application that allows them to stay organized. (37signals created the excellent tadalist.com, but I put that in a different category - a shareable listmaker.) Users have long needed a single todo list on which they could organize all their personal and professional tasks.

Enter the Good Experience todo list, or Gootodo for short: a Web-based app that in my experience is the most productive todo list I've ever seen, on any platform.

(To get a 30-day trial account, go to https://www.gootodo.com.)

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About Gootodo

There are four key components in Gootodo:

1. Each todo is associated with a particular day.

If you don't need to finish a todo today, redate it to a future day, so that it doesn't clutter your todo list today. (This is a paradigm shift from Outlook's task list, where every todo from now into the ages is shown, incredibly, on today's list!)

Here's something you don't generally hear in discussions about productivity: it's good to procrastinate. In Gootodo, you should move todos as far in the future as possible (remember, "let the bits go"). This way, today's list is filtered to the fewest, and most important, todos.

Of course, if you finish everything on today's list, you can look at future days and begin completing those todos as well... and if you don't complete a todo today, at midnight it rolls over into tomorrow's list.

2. Each todo has a ranking within its day.

For example, in today's todo list (see first image below), you can use the arrow buttons to re-order the todos so that the highest-priority item is always on top.

A good exercise at 9:00 a.m. every morning is to filter the todos for today: redating non-critical todos into future days, and sorting today's todos from most to least important. You then have an ordered list of everything you need to get done today - and you always know what you should be working on at any moment: the todo on top!

3. Each todo has both a summary and a detail.

This allows the user to view the todo list by summary, but also store notes that are accessible in a detail view. This way you can store all the textual context around a todo item in the todo list, without having to cross-reference with other files.

For example: you can create a todo called "call steve", and in the details, you can write (or paste) the entire meeting agenda, and of course steve's phone number.

4. Any e-mail program can create new todos - for today or a day in the future.

This is perhaps the most important advance that Gootodo offers over any other productivity tool. Easy example: if you're in a meeting with your Blackberry and think of a new todo, just e-mail today's todo list address. Gootodo reads the e-mail and creates a new todo: the subject line of the e-mail becomes the summary, and the body of the e-mail becomes the detail.

Another example: If you e-mail someone a question, just BCC the Gootodo address (for today or in the future), which will create a todo item, on the correct day, reminding you to follow up with that person to make sure you got a response.

Linking your e-mail - whether Outlook, Gmail, Blackberry, or any other mailer - to your todo list and a calendar allows for a significant jump in productivity. I personally use this feature all the time, every day.

Gootodo Screenshots

Here are a few screenshots of Gootodo.

Above is the main todo list view.

After clicking New Todo in the first image, you can (above) create a summary and, optionally, details for the new todo.

Clicking redate allows you to send any todo to any date in the future.

Above is a future day's todo list.

Try Gootodo now: To get a 30-day trial account, go to https://www.gootodo.com.

See also: Summary of the e-mail/Gootodo method

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More notes:

Gootodo boosts productivity and thus is not for free (after the 30-day free trial, anyway). If used correctly as your only todo list, Gootodo can dramatically boost your personal productivity, saving you time, money, and energy and freeing you up to spend time on profitable, fun, or personally meaningful activities.

Gootodo is a productivity tool, not a listmaker. If you want a tool to help you make lots and lots of lists, then use a listmaker - which is totally different from what Gootodo does. If you'd really rather use a listmaker, then we'd recommend tadalist.com and rememberthemilk.com, both created by developers we like and respect.

Gootodo is insanely useful to people who use it right. Below are some comments from paying customers (three of our first early adopters, in fact).

Testimonials

"Simple. Clever. Genuinely useful. Gootodo is a keeper."
- Mike B.

"Gootodo is a to-do list for everyone from geeks to grandmothers. It is powerful and easy, the best of all combinations."
- Ted, Omaha, Nebraska

"My productivity has increased since I started using Gootodo. It helps me keep my inbox clean and lets me quickly and easily prioritize short- and long-term tasks."
- Elizabeth A.

"Thanks to everyone at GooTodo fo such a great service! Dave Allen's system wasn't quite working for me... I had "Next Actions" lists all over the place, and multiplying. Only when I started putting all my next actions into GooTodo did I start to get a handle on things. Now I deal much more efficiently with those moments when I have to actually decide what to do next. No more wondering which list to look at, much less where they all are. And the increase in my productivity is pretty amazing."
- Lenni H., Dallas, Texas

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Questions, comments? Contact me: mark@goodexperience.com.

P.S. If you're interested in other Goo' apps, see our free e-inviter site at Goovite.com.

P.P.S. The logos for Gootodo, Goovite, and Gel were all drawn by Sam Brown from explodingdog.com. Buy his books.

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