CEIVA view point FRAMED

Posts Tagged ‘competition’

Two evenings ago, the New York Times posted an article in their “Gadgetwise” column entitled: Filling a Photo Frame via a Celluar Network. Rik Fairlie, the author, describes how bothersome it can be for adult children to keep the digital frames, given to parents as gifts, stocked with fresh photos. He writes, “you’re probably tired of driving over to your parents’ house to deliver a new SD card that refreshes the photos.” Fairlie then goes on to say that  “Soon, you won’t have to. A new company called Isabella Products will start a service called Vizit in mid-October that lets you send photos… to digital photo frame remotely.”

HUH? WHA? SOON YOU WON’T HAVE TO???

We here at CEIVA started offering photo sharing services to remote frames over 9 years ago. In fact, the New York Times wrote a story about CEIVA providing this type of service back in 2000.  Then in 2002, they wrote a story about grandparents and how the CEIVA photo share technology can keep them connected to family.

Now, I do not have a problem with telling the Vizit story and writing of the service they want to provide. But to taut this type of service as NEW… that just isn’t right. I mean let’s give credit for innovation where credit is due. In today’s information age, a little bit of research would have set the record straight.

So for the sake of journalistic accuracy and clarification, I thought I would post a comment on the “Gadgetwise” article citing how the New York Times had already announced this innovation years ago. Written below is a copy of what I wrote as a comment… which, at the time of writing this blog, oddly has not been posted.

All I can think of is “Imitation is the most serious form of flattery.”

While the ability to share and send digital photos to remote frames may seem new to some, actually it is a service we here at CEIVA have been providing our frame owners for nearly a decade now.

In fact, The New York Times has covered the CEIVA story from our start back in 2000. Here are some excerpts from past New York Times articles:

1.) NYT ARTICLE: STATE OF THE ART; A Frame To Hold Your Pixels, By Peter H. Lewis Published: Thursday, March 2, 2000 “Using Ceiva’s technology, one can send up-to-the-minute pictures of the kids to Grandma’s bedside table anywhere in the country…”

2.) NYT ARTICLE: Digital-Generation Gifts for Radio-Generation Parents, By Jeffrey Selingo Published: Thursday, November 21, 2002 “…interested in sending your parents new pictures of the grandchildren every day, you might consider the Ceiva picture frame…”

3.) NYT ARTICLE: When a Picture Is So Good It Deserves a Frame, By Wilson Rothman Published: June 5, 2007 “Ceiva, which pioneered the connected frame concept more than seven years ago… downloads pictures that you have uploaded or family members have shared.”

We here at CEIVA continue to improve our products, and in the time since these articles were written our digital frames have evolved and improved a great deal.

While our users have been able to send pictures from their cell phones to a CEIVA Frame for quite a few years now, last November we created a FREE iPhone app called CEIVA Snap… which our users love.

Facebook users also enjoy the FREE CEIVA Sender app we have developed. This simple app allows users to send pictures directly out of their Facebook Albums and into family and friend’s CEIVA Frames.

CEIVA is proud to have been the innovative leader in the world of photo sharing to digital photo frames… and we look forward to developing new ways to make the photo sharing experience even more rewarding as time and technology moves on.

So for now, even though the New York Times has forgotten it… that’s what CeivaJoe knows.

COMMENT

Yesterday the Internet was all abuzz and twittering about SilverPac’s SilverFrame being shown at Computex in Taipei.

Engadget’s blog on the subject thought that SilverPac was doing “it’s best to break the boring mold of typical digital photo frames”. While over at Gizmodo they wondered if “SilverPac SilverFrame Is a Questionably Acceptable Use of the Term ‘Digital Picture Frame’.”

All this got me wondering, and wanting to ask a few questions.

• Is SilverPac truly “breaking the mold” or is it snuffing out the digital frame’s true purpose?
• At what point does a manufacturer cram a “frame” so full with technology and functionality that it no longer becomes a digital frame and becomes something else?
• Are the engineers that designed this “frame,” thinking that just because it has a video screen it needs to be filled up with a lot of gadgetry like a computer?

When it comes to product design for digital photo frames I could not help but think of two famous principles of GOOD design.

“LESS IS MORE” and “FORM FOLLOWS FUNCTION”

To be honest, I am not sure this “gadget” adheres to these basic design principles. Why do I say this? Well, picture frames (even “traditional” frames for old fashioned paper pictures) are such that they sit in the background in our homes and offices passively displaying and sharing images of past moments that mean so much to us. Be it simplistic, picture display is the function of the form.

So I can’t help but wonder. Do people really want to fiddle, futz and get greasy fingerprints on another gadget that has functions commonly found on their computer, or better yet, their cell phone?

If showing personal photos is to be the primary function of the form, then I believe these over designed forms are not true digital picture frames. But what are they? Well, to be honest I am not sure what to call them. I do know that at CEIVA, photo display/sharing is the primary function we honor in our forms.

So until the next post… that’s what CeivaJoe knows!

POST SCRIPT: Do I see a trend? Since posting this blog this morning I have come across another “video screened gadget” being reviewed with the hopes that it be considered a digital photo frame. PC WORLD says in their review of Trancend’s PF720 that it “does it all, but… might be too much for those looking for a straightforward picture frame.“  And Tom’s Hardware writes “We’re also wondering why SilverPac is calling this a digital picture frame…” Hmmm… I guess it is not only me after all.

COMMENT

Recently I was reading a blog where the author thought that it was almost magical how quickly digital photo frames have risen in popularity… which made me chuckle. What might seem to be an overnight sensation, I assure you, has been a long 9+ years of steady growth since CEIVA first introduced the digital picture frame to the world. Now our “crystal ball” which has served us well, reveals a secret as to just what will make digital frames even more popular with consumers in the future.

To foresee the future, it will help to look back at the past.

When digital cameras first hit the market they were interesting new novelties.  But soon digital camera owners began to realize that with each “click” there was a free picture that could be kept, or deleted. Gone were the days where one would have to wait and pay to see if the picture was a good one.  “Free” pictures made it easy for the digital camera to rise in popularity over the traditional film camera. However, while more pictures were being taken, most were not being seen. Pictures were and still are just stored away on a computer as data files.

Then a little while later… abracadabra! cell phones with built-in cameras appeared. These types of digital cameras added to the ease and opportunity for picture taking. Finally, it seemed as if everyone was taking digital photos with more and more wanting quick, convenient and inexpensive way to display them.

During the rise of the digital camera, we here at CEIVA were producing our magical digital photo frames that revolutionized and defined the industry. In fact, for many years after we first introduce our frames, we pretty much were the ONLY company manufacturing them.

But those days are over. Now it seems, with each new day, a new digital frame magically appears in the market; while “POOF” another frame manufacturer goes out of business, but not before offering their frame at “bargain” super discounted price.

All this hocus pocus makes for a tough market. To remain competitive, and snag any share of the market, manufacturers crank out all sorts of cheap mini gadget “monitors.”  In the rush to get anything that will display an image they miss that first and foremost what they are producing is a picture frame… that happens to be digital.  They focus more on the techno gadget and never consider what pictures mean to the people taking them.

Right from the start, CEIVA has never lost sight of what pictures meant to people. Pictures, be they paper or digital, are moments of our lives that we want to show and share. Showing our photos in a traditional frame has always been easy. Sharing, unless you had extra prints made, was a bit more difficult. That is where our crystal ball comes in.

From the beginning we here at CEIVA saw only a digital future that allowed for both showing AND sharing.  And while most digital frame manufactures still only consider the showing side of pictures, CEIVA saw that technology could also transform the way we shared our pictures. Frames, for the first time could, be that gateway technology that allowed for sharing. So from the start we “built in” a functionality that makes our frames different from all others… that functionality is the ability to SHARE pictures from frame to frame, no matter WHERE the frames are located.

So if you were looking for a quality frame that shows and SHARES your cherished photo, then your future looks bright with a CEIVA.

So until the next post… that’s what CeivaJoe knows!

COMMENT

Recently I was searching the web looking for what’s new in the world of Digital Photo Frames (DPFs) when I came across this article:  Cubit Launches Photo Frame with Built-in Florescent Light.

Well, I have to admit that title peaked my interest. Why? Well, a frame with a built in florescent lamp  seemed like an odd feature to add to a frame. I just couldn’t help but wonder if the light, when turned on, put a glare over the frame’s screen.

Then I got to thinking about frames in general. It seems that lately, there is a FLOOD of new frames hitting the market, with many having some sort of “shiny” new gadget added on. It is as if the manufactures think that the more they add to their frame the more consumers will be attracted to buy it. (Kinda reminds me of this scene of Dory in Finding Nemo… but I digress.)

Anyway, I’ve seen digital picture frames with all sorts of add-ons integrated into them including such things as:

• Speakers
• Video Playback
• Television
• Photo Scanning
• Telephone
• Spy camera
• Alarm Clock
• Pen Holder
• Mirror
• News Tickers
• Photo printer
• Weather Report
• Mini Monitors

Now this is not to say that all these features are dumb. In fact, we here at CEIVA are always thinking of ways to improve our photo frames, and we have had our own share of dumb ideas. But we have learned that what works best is to stay true to what the product is… a  picture frame, that just HAPPENS to be digital.

In the 9 years CEIVA has been in the digital frame biz our customers have taught us a lot about how they use their frames in their lives.  While their frames are a big part of their daily life, they’ve shared that they don’t need or want their frame to be loaded with gadgets that constantly need to be tweaked, tinkered or fussed with like a Play Station controller.

So until the next post… that’s what CeivaJoe knows!

COMMENT