Web Worker Daily

What’s the limit to the number of people you can maintain relationships with? What about online relationships?

British anthropologist Robin Dunbar suggests that 150 is the maximum number of people with whom any one person can maintain stable social relationships. That theoretical limit is known to sociologists and anthropologists as Dunbar’s number.

Might the number change when you’re talking about online relationships? Do tools like email, instant messaging, blogs, micro-blogs, and online social networks reduce friction and increase communication enough that the number of relationships you can maintain online might be greater than 150?

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What does the new way of working look like? Maybe something like Alpine Access, a Denver-based virtual call center. I spoke with Chris Carrington, Alpine Access CEO, about how he’s growing this business — #17 on Deloitte’s Fast 50 for Colorado — using experienced home-based workers, web-style computing, and online social networking tools.

Here’s how Alpine Access uses the new way of working to succeed:

Offer home-based employment. Alpine Access hires U.S.-based call center representatives who work from their own homes. Agents earn between $8 and $13 an hour, receive health insurance and other employee benefits, and can climb a career ladder into team leader and account manager positions. In contrast to some other virtual call centers who mainly hire contractors who don’t get paid for training and don’t receive employee benefits, Alpine Access chooses to hire employees in order to attract the very best candidates.

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The Wall Street Journal’s CareerJournal offers tips about talking politics in the workplace, including “If you do want to share your opinions, don’t bash those with whom you disagree” and “Don’t assume people feel the way you think they do.” That’s even more important to keep in mind if your workplace extends onto the web, through tools like blogs. Instead of being heard by three people in the break room, your rant about one presidential candidate or another could be read by thousands and archived for future bosses or clients to see.

But the web is such a great place to discuss political ideas and candidates, you may not want to rule out political discussion online entirely. You may seek authenticity and transparency in the way you conduct yourself online — that’s an attitude common to many web workers — and you may enjoy honestly expressing your opinion about issues that matter. If you do have an urge to join into the political conversation, however, you need to do it in a way that doesn’t create a long-lasting reputation for extremism or rancor.

Do you join into political conversation online? If so, how?

If you’re self-employed or thinking about it and you live in the U.S., one of your biggest concerns is likely to be health insurance. Most people in the U.S. — about 60% according to the National Coalition on Health Care — get health coverage through their employers.

But the health insurance outlook for the self-employed is not as bad as you might think. If you are reasonably healthy, you might be surprised how cheaply you can arrange coverage, especially if you choose a high-deductible health plan. And now that health insurers are looking for growth beyond their bread-and-butter large group policies, you could see even better rates as those insurers compete for your health coverage dollars.

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I love my Google Calendar, but I also like the physical experience of planning my days, weeks, and months using a paper calendar or planner. Here are three possibilities for when you want to manage your life with pen and paper instead of using an online calendar.

Doodle while you plan

With a pack of multi-colored gel pens and this 8 Days-A-Week Doodle Planner available from See Jane Work, you’ll be all ready to doodle your plans and dreams each week as you plan out your days. “8 days a week” means it shows Monday through Sunday plus Someday, so you have room to write things you want to get done as you have a spare moment. The Doodle part of it means you get blank pages interspersed with the weekly schedules to draw pictures, do a mind map of your week, or take random notes.

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The key to using Google Docs (GDocs) document editing effectively is to understand that it’s a web word processor rather than an outright replacement for full-featured desktop word processors like Microsoft Word. GDocs includes features that make it easy to produce content for the web — it understands HTML (though not as well as it should), makes it easy to put in links inside and across documents, allows you to publish online, and encourages collaboration with features like version control and real-time multi-person editing.

If you go to the Google Docs home page, you can create documents, spreadsheets, presentations, and folders to organize it all. This article focuses only on the word processing aspects of Google Docs — and looks at features that make it easier for you to get in a web word processing state of mind.

Edit the HTML directly. From the “Edit” page of your document, click on the “Edit HTML” link to the right of the “Revisions” tab. You’ll view the raw HTML of the document — and I mean raw. It’s not at all easy to read, lacking as it is in whitespace. If you want to do anything more than minor tweaks, you might want to take it to your favorite HTML editor to do so.

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If you’re a digital bedouin who works out of WiFi cafés, you get to drink yummy drinks while you aim for inbox zero. But make grande mochas a habit and you might start looking pretty grande yourself. Starbucks wants to help with a new set of low-fat, low-calorie drinks. Are you buying? Or do you already have a favorite drink?

So far, Starbucks’ new offering doesn’t sound too promising. Baristas are none too thrilled with the so-called “skinny” platform that means a drink with sugar-free syrup, nonfat milk, and no whipped cream. And customers may not like it either, if early reviews are any indication.

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As more people work out of their home part- or full-time, they’re looking for offices or dedicated workspaces in their houses, according to The New York Times:

But by 2006, according to data collected by the Dieringer Research Group, a marketing research company in Brookfield, Wis., more than 28 million Americans were working from home at least part time — an increase of 10 percent from just the year before, and 40 percent from 2002. The American Home Furnishings Alliance reports that 7 in 10 Americans now have offices or designated workstations in their homes, a 112 percent increase since 2000. And a recent survey by the National Association of Home Builders found that home offices ranked as the fourth most important feature in a new upscale home, just ahead of security.

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