As Chris Shipley, DemoFall's organiser, noted, sometimes it seems we spend half our time in meetings and the other half preparing for them.

One of my favourite start-ups at Demo, Tungle ( www.tungle.com ), is trying to make it easier to organise meetings between colleagues or contacts. The Montreal-based company has invented an e-mail plug-in that allows users to share calendars and set appointments easily. It works with all versions of Microsoft Outlook and Tungle promises to extend compatibility to Google Calendar, Yahoo Calendar and Lotus Notes shortly.