Social media has changed almost every aspect of life in the past decade, but until recently productivity software has remained more or less a stand-alone affair. You log on, look at your list, add some stuff, and maybe cross something off. When the list grows debilitatingly long, you seldom have anyone around to help you sort it out. And when you're short on motivation, you have no one to encourage you.

New productivity services could offer a refreshing change from the isolated to-do lists and single-driver project management systems of yore by providing socially driven task management with low overhead and open connectivity to popular social sites such as and , as well as integration with business tools like .

Of course, whether adding a social component actually makes anyone more productive is a matter of debate. I test-drove a handful of the more prominent social productivity tools on the Web. Here's my take.

In much the same way Foursquare awards points and badges to users who check in at coffee shops, bars, and restaurants, (pronounced "joom") awards you points and badges for doing the stuff you want to do anyway. If you're the competitive sort, this setup can quickly get you over the inertia of a long and seemingly unsortable to-do list and motivate you to start doing things so you can rack up the points.