Austin360 blogs > Digital Savant > Archives > 2011 > January > 05 > Entry
Project 2011 Tech-Awesome YOU! (Pt. 3: digital de-cluttering)
If the room looks like this, can you imagine that computer’s e-mail inbox? Time to de-clutter! Image from “Hoarders,” via A&E Television Networks.
And now, the final steps before you have successfully completed Project 2011 Tech-Awesome YOU! On Monday, we got your digital photos and videos off errant memory cards and on Tuesday, we tackled the burden of backing up all your important data.
Now that you’ve got all your photos and videos organized and backed up, you may find that these most important files are surrounded by lots of stuff you don’t really need.
Start with your computer’s desktop: if you’ve got more than 10 icons there, consider filing some away in folders or other easy-to-access locations. You don’t have to delete them, just get them out of sight so you’re not overwhelmed every time you boot up with a screen full of applicatoins and file names.
Look at your Mac’s Applications folder or your Windows PC’s “Add or Remove Programs” or “Uninstall Programs” (under “Control Panel”) to see if there are applications you no longer need and can remove from your machine.
The same goes for your smart phone. If you’ve got lots of apps and games installed that you no longer use, get rid of them. In most cases, you can add them back on or download them again later if you find you need. Delete photos and videos from your phone that you’ve transferred to your computer if you don’t need to carry them around. If you want to get ambitious, start going through your contact list and deleting outdated/old contacts.
Most daunting of all may be tackling your e-mail inbox. If you’ve never heard of “Inbox Zero,” it’s the exhilarating feeling you get when you’ve managed to delete, respond to and file away everything in your inbox, leaving it empty and pristine. While that goal may not be attainable for all of us, you can go a long way toward getting there by mass-deleting old 2010 correspondence and creating file folders to get as many messages as possible out of your inbox.
If the flood of e-mail never seems to stop, you can cut down on some of it by shifting some of your non-personal e-mail to a service like Austin-based OtherInbox and saving your primary inbox for person-to-person mails.
You’ll be surprised by how much clear-headed and focused you’ll be when you’re not constantly staring at screens and screens of e-mail subject lines.
Get rid of accounts on social media sites you no longer visit (so long, MySpace!) or web e-mail services you no longer use.
And while you’re at it, take a look at your home office and see if there are peripherals or gadgets you no longer need. Did you upgrade your scanner and keep the old one? Donate it to Goodwill. Did you recently upgrade your cell phone? You can donate your old one to CellPhonesForSoldiers.com or check out the Electronics Take Back Coalition’s tips for safely recycling electronics.
Austinite Lorie Marrero, whom we often cite as an expert on staying organized, has excellent resources on her website, ClutterDiet.com, for cutting back on physical and virtual clutter. You can keep up with her tips on twitter.com/clutterdiet.
Take that, 2011. It’ll be a much better, less stressful, year of tech if we can just start it off right.
Got more organizing, recycling and de-cluttering tips? Post them in the comments.
Permalink | Comments (1) | Post your comment Categories: Computers, Gadgets, Internet, Phones
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By Joshua Baer
January 6, 2011 10:03 AM | Link to this
Great suggestions Omar! Also, don't forget to unsubscribe from emails that you don't want to receive anymore.