Should water-cooler chat be left offline?

Tools for informal chat are believed to lend themselves to collaborative communication. But are they more suited to office gossip and cute gifs?

The all-too-familiar reflex of minimising an open Facebook tab as your manager approaches could soon be relinquished to the past, as Facebook looks to legitimise its infiltration into our working lives. Itrecently launched "Facebook at work", now officially titled "Workplace", provides users an entirely separate professional Facebook account through which they can communicate with colleagues and workmates. Workplace is already in more than a thousand organisations worldwide , sold to businesses with a per-user price plan. There's even a separate work-chat app, so you can install a shop-talk exclusive messenger to your iPhone or Android.

Facebook isn't the only company making a corporate grab for our social space at work. Workplace has been in the making for almost two years, hoping to rival Slack and Yammer, chat software which facilitates more casual conversations among colleagues. It seems water cooler chat has become quite a commodity.