internet

www.doodle.ch/

If you've ever had to organise a meeting between a lot of people or organise a large social or business event or even just arrange a family get-together then you need Doodle. 

The concept is very simple, Doodle creates a sort of online diary that you send to all the participants for them to fill in the dates when they are free.  From this information you can pick the day when all, or at least most, can attend. 

All event or meeting organisers will immediately realise what a marvellous thing this is as it avoids the thousands of emails, phone messages and, now, text messages that go back and forth from people saying that they can, or can't, make a particular date.

It's easy to use, too.  You simply create what the site calls a poll and populate it with possible dates and times and, of course, details of the event and send a link out to everyone.  They then open it in their browsers, fill in the times when they are available and save the information.

Back at base, you watch the replies arriving

Back at base, you watch the replies arriving and, when you have all the answers, you select the date that is the most convenient.

For anyone charged with the task of getting a group of people together, even a small group, this can prove invaluable but its usefulness does not stop there.  You can use it as a poll in the sense that it asks a question and you seek answers to that question from a group of people.  The website suggests polling people to see what food would be required but I am sure that it will find many other much more individual and innovative uses, apart from this.

The website is simplicity itself and contains just the pages needed to explain the concept, deal with the all important privacy policy and allow you to create a new poll.  This is a simple idea but well thought out and will prove extremely useful and, even if you don't spend your time arranging multi-person meetings, keep it in mind when you do need to do something similar in the future.

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