Everyone is always falling on and off the GTD wagon, but I've been hooked on a great to-do organizer called Remember the Milk (RTM). If you are looking for a way to keep yourself organized going into the new school year, this post is for you. This post will talk about the pros and cons of the service, its application for students and a demo of how I personally use it.
Now is a great time to get yourself organized. It's just before school and you might be looking for something new.
To-Dos in the Cloud
One of the biggest selling points about RTM--to me--is its free-ness and the fact that it's in the clouds. The online interface is straightforward and clean. It has Google Gears, so you can access your tasks even when you're not online. Get the benefits of having info online and also avoid getting screwed if the campus WiFi goes down.
RTM also boasts just about every possible method of ingestion. Currently you can add tasks from a GMail sidebar, an iPhone, a BlackBerry, any Windows Mobile phone, Twitter, Google Calendar and... you get the point.
Student Application
Well this is all fine and dandy but how can us students use RTM? Since laptops are the primary computer choice of most students and campus-wide WiFi is now a selling point for schools, a cloud-based to-do manager makes sense.
And whether an iPhone is outside of your price range or not, the barrier for entry is low for Remember the Milk, which makes it perfect for students. As with most web applications, this sucker is on the freemium pricing model: you get most of the functionality for free.
Do It Like This
How do I use it? Let's take a look.
Whenever I'm sitting down to work, I always make sure I've got an RTM window open. I keep this window on the "Overview" view of tasks. Another important note: this gets its own separate window. It keeps me on task and focused.
To enter in tasks when I'm at my computer, I use the RTM Quicksilver plugin. A few keystrokes and the task is in my system.
If I'm on the road, RTM has a personalized email addresses for each user. I just send a task to the address from my new iPhone 3G and it's off my mind. (It would also work with my previous phone, the LG VX6200.)
Remember the Milk offers a great, free service that can be checked and maintained from just about any device, save maybe pen and paper.
Do you use or have you tried Remember the Milk? What do you think? OR What do you use as your personal organization system? Let us know in some comments!