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Posts Tagged ‘photo sharing’

These “times of our lives” sure can be full, hectic, complex… and fleeting.  Never before has there been so much to do, see and encounter. Technology and innovation has made it possible for us to experience so much of what the world has. So thankfully, in the craziness of being ever on the go, filling our lives with doing-doing-doing, one of the things we do is take pictures.

Technology has definitely made picture taking more popular and accessible. Gone are the days when one had to worry about, adjusting the aperture, running out of film, or the cost of developing prints. Today we can easily snap a picture of everything we do and just delete what we don’t like… and it doesn’t cost a penny.

But besides the facts that photos are easier to take and we are taking more than ever before, has anything else really changed with our pictures? Not really. The multitude of digital images we store in our computers are as precious to us as the old prints we store in shoe-boxes under our beds.

Photographs, unlike any other medium, are precious because they instantly connect us to the people, places and events of our lives. Whether one quickly glances upon a single framed photo on a shelf or sits down to go through an entire album, pictures have the power to pull us in and in an instant take our hearts to another emotional somewhere. This emotional tug, be it to happiness or sadness, that a picture has, is real and it is powerful.

And… the “tug” never stops. As time passes a photo’s emotional pull my change, flipping from happiness to sadness and vice versa, but it never ends. In fact if anything it gets stronger.  For the older a picture gets the more it seems to pull at our hearts and reminds us that life truly is fleeting. When looking at an old photo, the hectic, crazy complexities of life, at the time the photo was taken, disappear. All that remains is the connection back, tugging on our hearts.

Until my next post… that’s what CeivaJoe knows.

Let’s face it; it’s that time of year when one can go a little crazy trying to find that ONE special gift for a special person that is just… well, just perfect. While most of us, at some point in our lives, have been on the receiving end of what we know was the perfect gift, many of us still fail to deliver on what we thought would be a perfect gift.

Why, do we often fall short when it comes to giving what we’d hope was a perfect gift? Well, to answer that question let’s look at what makes the perfect gift “perfect”. First, not only does the perfect gift need to be both useful and meaningful to the recipient; but let’s be realistic, it also has to fit into your gift giving budget. But more importantly, what truly really makes a gift perfect is the fact that it touches a recipient in a profound way. A perfect gift will take into consideration and honor the lifestyle, interests, and needs of the recipient, yet connect on a deeper level than other gifts.

So with that being said, you might be surprised to read that I believe that the typical digital picture frame is NOT the perfect gift… unless you take the time to personalize it so that it connects on a deeper level. A digital frame is just the means of delivery, not the gift. The gift is, as KODAK once said, “the moments of our lives” that are shared and displayed on the frame.

How do you personalize the gift of a digital frame? Well, that’s easy. When you first give a digital frame have it “loaded” ready to display photos that are meaningful to the recipient. However, be aware that digital frames are not like traditional frames that hold a single print. Most (not all) digital frames, usually end up showing the same pictures over and over again. Digital frames can quickly become stale energy sucking lumps of plastic, glass and metal if not updated. Over time, that gift you wanted to be personal over time just becomes annoying.

However, one type of digital frame, known as a “connected” frame, will remotely access new photos and ultimately deliver the perfect gift of fresh new photos for years to come.

Connected frames, such ones made by CEIVA, receive photos sent directly to them from any computer or standard camera phone. Plus, while CEIVA’s can directly connect to a computer via WiFi, these digital frames do NOT have to receive photos in this way. CEIVA frames also receive photos through a traditional phone land-line or Ethernet connection. (Land-line connectivity makes CEIVA frames ideal for seniors and less tech savvy people that do not have a computer or the Internet.)

Regardless of the type of connection used, these unique frames ultimately access CEIVA’s photo hosting and delivery service, known as Picture Plan. Picture Plan makes photo storing, sharing and editing an easy, safe and secure process. It also provides frame owners a way to invite family and friends in to send and share their pictures to the frame. The fact that CEIVA frames can have fresh new photos delivered right to them from loved ones keeps that personal connection alive and ultimately makes them a perfect gift.

Last week technology product review sites and blogs were all a-buzz about Hewlett Packard’s latest product release… the HP DreamScreen.  Because so much was being said I found myself enticed to read more and more. But the more I read the more I noticed a pattern develop. I noticed that many “industry experts” were confused and unsure as to what the DreamScreen is or is not supposed to be.

Below are 16 quotes from various technology gurus and geeks who grappled with their own understanding on just how to best describe what  the HP DreamScreen is and/or is not. As you read through these quotes note that what they have to say about the DreamScreen is quite varied, perplexing and at times contradictory. Regardless, I am pretty sure this is NOT the industry buzz HP wanted.

• CNET ASIA-Crave “There are products which simply defy categorization.”
  

• Tech News World “DreamScreen …is it some sort of hobbled tablet netbook, or is it a pumped-up digital photo frame?”
  

• Business  Week “HP turns the digital photo frame into an electronic social calendar.“

• Mashable “HP’s new DreamScreen Tablet is some type of hybrid between a computer, a digital photo frame, and a music player. “

• Coolest Gadgets “In the case of the HP DreamScreen, it might not be fair to call it a digital photo frame.”

• Venture Beat “It’s a category of computer that is suitable for casual use by broader, mainstream audiences who might use it while browsing TV.”

• Geek.com “HP’s DreamScreen wants to be the iPod of digital photo frames.”

• Yahoo Tech “Depending on how you look at it, the sleek new DreamScreen is either a very powerful digital photo frame or a fairly limited Internet tablet—take your pick.”

• The Inquisitr “HP DreamScreen Shouldn’t Be Called A Digital Photo Frame.”

• eHomeUpgrade “HP Launches the HP DreamScreen Infotainment Display“

• Digital Picture Frame Review “I hesitate to call the DreamScreen just a digital picture frame, although it does do that. So it’s more than a frame – it truly is a new platform.”

• Gadget Republic “You see, the DreamScreen is like a smart TV/lightweight laptop hybrid tablet that has plenty of interactivity and always-on connection via Wi-Fi but it serves the purpose of being an aesthetically pleasing media hub.”

• CNET Crave “It sort of reminds me of a super-sized Chumby–another interesting jack-of-all-trades gadget that never really seemed to take off.”

• PC Magazine “The DreamScreen is meant to act as a wireless gateway to the Internet and all of the digital media stored on your network and other home computers.”

• Tech News World “HP has shared its dream with the world, but not everyone is sure what to make of it. The DreamScreen is much more than a digital picture frame, but much less than a tablet PC.”
  

• PC World “But the DreamScreen, for me, is stuck in tablet purgatory. It’s not quite the tablet I want it to be and too expensive to justify as a replacement for the digital picture frame I never use.”

The more I read articles (with quote like these) the more I could not help but think that if the industry experts, whose business is to know and understand new technology, don’t understand what the DreamScreen is, then how does HP expect the consuming public to understand it and in turn buy it?

What finally solidified my concerns that HP has some marketing work to do on the DreamScreen was when I read a quote by Leslie Fiering of Gartner Research.  Ms Fiering, a vice president covering mobile computing concluded that “the DreamScreen appears to be an interesting product in search of a use.

So just what is the HP DreamScreen? Is it a tablet PC? Is it a Digital Frame? Is it  Social Calendar? Is it a Lite Weight TV? Or is it an Infotainment Display or possibly a Media Hub? Personally, from what I can deduce from my own reading, I think PC Magazine probably best describes what the HP DreamScreen is all about. However I won’t truly know until I actually set one up and and use it for awhile.

Regardless of what HP intended the DreamScreen to be, the industry is not getting it.

For more information about HP’s DreamScreen I recommend you visit the DreamScreen website.

The digital picture frame designers at CEIVA have tapped into the fact that more and more photos are being stored on home computers.  The new CEIVA Pro80 frame has been designed for easy access directly to an entire photo collection kept there. A clever new feature included in CEIVA’s newest frame is its built-in connectivity that allows photo streaming from Windows Media Server back to it.

Like all other CEIVA frames, the Pro 80 ingeniously connects to the internet to allow friends and family across the world to share their pictures by sending them directly into it. This exclusive internet connection is one of services that are bundled within the CEIVA Picture Plan. One year of the CEIVA Picture Plan is included FREE with every CEIVA Pro80.

The CEIVA Pro 80 features a high resolution 8-inch active matrix digital LCD screen, 640 x 480 display resolution, standard memory card readers, WiFi adapter, interchangeable face plates and CEIVA’s Perfect True-to-Photo display that puts an end to photo stretching, cropping or squishing. Internet connectivity is via WiFi or traditional phone line.

The soon to be released (release date 8/10/09) CEIVA Pro 80 has a list price of $179.99.

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

The 4th of July reminds us of the heroic choice and sacrifices the men and women in the armed forces make to protect the freedoms and independence our country celebrates.

One of the biggest sacrifices  members of the military make  is moving their lives far from friends and family that love them. While we all know how they treasure hearing from “home,” Sargent Carlos V’s letter below reminds us how important it is that they also have a way to share what is happening in their lives BACK to “home.”

Hi, CEIVA!

My name is TSgt. (USAF) Carlos R. V. and I would like to tell you how CEIVA has been a life saver for us.

I have been in the Military for 13 years and have never had a way of getting photos to my parents as I am currently stationed in Germany. My Dad is retired Air Force and is now settled back in home in Houston Texas with my Mom. To send them pictures I would have to take the pictures, wait for them to get developed and make the long trip from Germany to Texas.

My parents were scared of computers and any new technology. So without them wanting a computer there was no way for me to e-mail pictures, until I came across CEIVA. I was kind of scared that my parents would reject the idea of connecting something to their phone line, but they seemed interested. I told my Dad to go to work and have someone show him the CEIVA website and how it was hooked (up).

Right away he purchased the frame and was ready to go. He had no complications, the instructions were super easy to follow and he told me that he was up and ready, and waiting for pictures.

With CEIVA we are able to send pictures every day. My parents are still in shock that I can take pictures of my daughter’s birthday party here in Germany and my parents are able to see the pictures the same day. It is amazing to them.

With me being in Germany I have been able to do a lot of traveling so it makes it easy for me to take a lot of pictures. But I just wanted to say this product has been perfect for our situation. My parents love it, and we are planning on getting one for my wife’s family.

Thank you CEIVA for making it easy for us to stay close, even though we are so far away.

Sincerely,
TSgt. Carlos R. V.
United States Air Force

CEIVA is proud to provide a way for our military and women to show their lives with their loved ones.

So, except for wishing you a picturesque 4th of July… that’s what CeivaJoe knows.

COMMENT

They seem simple, they seem easy, they seem innocent enough. But many digital frame owners, who have bought and/or gifted typical “card reader” type frames are finding out that, like that beast of a plant in the Little Shop of Horrors, typical digital frames can become hungry creatures with demanding and hard to manage appetites.

Digital cameras have grown to be a much bigger part of all our lives than traditional film cameras ever were. Because this is so, owning and/or giving a digital frame to display the best pictures of our lives has become quite enticing. However, not knowing what to expect or need in digital frame has resulted in consumers often buying low functioning frames. How user friendly the frame is when it comes to selecting, editing and moving your favored pictures from a camera and into a frame, is rarely considered… especially when a buyer is dazzled with a super low price.

Without a doubt cameras make it so easy and convenient to generate pictures… a digital frame’s “food.” But, until you own a digital frame that regurgitates the same batch of old pictures over and over and over again, will you understand just how “hungry” a frame can get. What makes the hunger pains worse is the fact that you know you have a camera card or hard drive full of fresh pictures waiting to be fed into your digital frame(s).

If you are responsible for feeding pictures to multiple frames then the process becomes even more horrific. All the time and effort it took to feed your first frame must now be duplicated on the second frame. If that second frame has been given as a gift, typically to less tech savvy parents or grandparents, then feeding the second frame can be even more of a nightmare… especially if the frame is located away from your home  or a computer.

So while digital camera technology makes it easy to snap up the moments of our life, and snap we do, getting pictures to the frame(s) so that we can display and share those moments takes time and effort. Having one tool that allows you to easily (1) weed out, (2) edit/personalize (3) organize and (4) move pictures onto one or multiple frames are features and services not typically bundled with digital frames of today.  Except for one… CEIVA.

CEIVA provides their frame owners with one comprehensive tool to feed and care for all their digital frame’s picture display and sharing needs. Our frames, with our award winning Picture Plan, allow you to select, upload, safely store, edit/personalize, and send your treasured pictures directly into the hungry frames you manage and also share your pictures to the hungry frames owned by friends and family… even Grandma’s.

With CEIVA frames you can tame the framed digital beast and never hear the dreaded “Feed me Some-more!”

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

COMMENT

Digital cameras have made taking pictures a simple task. If your camera has a battery charge and enough space on its memory chip, then all you need to do is point and shoot.  CLICK CLICK CLICK… shoot now and deal with the picture file later.

But even though you can click a ton of pictures, your camera memory card can only hold so many picture files. At some point you need to move the pictures off your camera and on to your computer for safer storage. Once your pictures are over on a computer you often discover that not every picture was as good as you would like it. No worry, thanks to photo editing software like Google’s popular Picasa 3.0.

For those of you who don’t know, Picasa is an amazing and free (yes 100% FREE!) photo editing & organizing software that puts a powerful and easy tool into the amateur photographer’s hands. With Picasa you can do editing “basics” like the pros, including: crop, remove red eye, control brightness, add text and more! Plus there are a bunch of fun special effects too. Did I mention how EASY it is?

So how could such a cool editing tool be improved?  Simple, create a bridge from it right into a digital picture frame… and CEIVA has done just that. CEIVA has made it easy to have your photos, organized and edited in Picasa, to be moved right out of it and directly into your CEIVA frames and albums with its new CEIVA Sender for Picasa.

CEIVA is committed to make the “from camera to digital frame” digital picture process effortless. The CEIVA Sender for Picasa is the latest application developed exclusively for CEIVA digital frame owners. Other applications created for these unique state of the art digital photo frames include: CEIVA Sender for Face Book and CEIVA SNAP app for the iPhone.

To get your own free CEIVA Sender for Picasa download Picasa 3 first from here and then add CEIVA Sender plug-in from here to it. It’s that easy. Finally you can to CLICK CLICK CLICK, EDIT EDIT EDIT, and SEND SEND SEND using Picasa 3 fortified with CEIVA Sender.

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

COMMENT

I came across this story while reading through a HUGE stack of testimonials this week.  I have to confess each time I read it… I am moved. This heartfelt account reminded me that while some people might think what CEIVA makes is just another electronic contraption; in reality what we provide is so much bigger, deeper, rich and meaningful.  That’s why I thought I would share Karen’s story with you for Memorial Day, a time for remembering those in our past.

“This may be a bit of a sad story, but it is true nonetheless thanks to CEIVA.

My father had suffered from Thyroid and Bone cancer for three years. It had been dormant, but had become increasingly more active and aggressive since January. We made plans for my parents to come to Michigan for the summer, but as they live in Houston, Texas, and had to be close to the hospital, they had to stay home.

My parent’s 37th anniversary was this spring. My husband and I bought the CEIVA frame for their anniversary. I spent the time setting up and uploading and downloading the pictures. I created albums for each family and linked them to the receiver so that they would rotate daily.

I mailed it to them and told them to “Just plug it in!” When they did, they got the surprise of their lives! On the CEIVA frame were images of not only my family, but my sister and her family who lives in Dallas and my brother and his family who lives in San Diego. My parents were overwhelmed to be able to see all the pictures of everyone’s family and their grandchildren!

My father was in a great deal of pain and couldn’t seem to get comfortable in bed, so in the middle of the night he would wander out into the living room and sit in the recliner. He wouldn’t turn on the TV as not to wake my mother, so he would site in the dark and watch the CEIVA.

When my father was confined to a hospital bed (set up) in the dining room… they set the CEIVA up so that he could see it from bed.

My father passed away July 10th.

After the funeral, almost one hundred friends and family came to the house to have a meal and fellowship.  Everyone was excited about the CEIVA. People stood around it for hours looking at the pictures of our families and the CEIVA channels and such. Most of all, people where able to see the most recent pictures of my dad, in the days before his cancer was winning. It turned out to be a true bright spot in the day for everyone, especially us kids and our mom.

I am so glad that we purchased the CEIVA in time for my dad to truly enjoy it.

… I just wanted you to know how CEIVA has touched our lives.”

Karen P.

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

COMMENT

Big news for Facebook fans! We just launched CEIVA Sender for Facebook, an all-new application that lets our members send photos straight from Facebook to CEIVA digital frames.

It’s another fast and easy way for our customers to share their photos with loved ones across the world.

Take it for a spin and let us know how you use CEIVA Sender for Facebook to share your life as it happens.

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

COMMENT