I'm IMing asking "Have they shown up yet? What's happening?" I feel so out of touch. Grrr.

My new office people have never used IM for work stuff. I've mentioned it subtly a few times but no one has followed up. but I don't want to be the new person changing everything on the first week.

We've recently started using it. Creates a slightly different dynamic than email, which is interesting. But also, related to the work from home discussion above, it gives you Big Brother-like powers to check up on people since it monitors your status (free, busy, away etc.) They may not be able to tell if I spend the whole day reading recaps on TWoP (not that that would ever happen), but you can see if it's been longer than five or ten minutes since you touched your computer.

I HATE not having IM at work.

What are the benefits of IM over email?

It's usually much faster. for quick questions.

also snide comments.

and lunch plans

We just use the subject line for that. Since it pops up on the screen when it's sent I guess it serves the same purpose. I guess I hate to think people that people would expect an even quicker response, when 99 times out of 100 stopping immediately to address things is remarkably inefficient.

Plus, I think because IM is more casual, and there's generally no record kept, it's better for asking stuff like "what's X's phone number" I hate sending email for that crap. But email is better for creating a record and covering your ass.

My brother uses IM at work a lot but he almost always has his status set to red (away, I guess), but he puts a message in there like "working on a project; email requests" so it looks like he's still present. I mean, I think he usually is there working on stuff. He just hates to be bothered when he's in the middle of stuff.

Our email does not pop up on screen, so lots of email get ignored.