SmartFrame and contextual computing unlocks personal photo and video libraries
PALO ALTO, Calif. & SAN FRANCISCO & NEW YORK–(BUSINESS WIRE)–October 28, 2014–
Today, Fireside, Inc. announced Fireside, a smart system for your home that makes enjoying all your photos and videos as easy as taking them.
Fireside reinvented the digital photo frame, creating a dedicated family channel within the home. (Photo: Business Wire)
“With the popularity of cameras, mobile phones and tablets, taking pictures has never been easier, but we really only get to enjoy a small fraction of them,” said Andy Jagoe, CEO and Founder of Fireside. “Fireside’s mission is to unlock all of these hidden memories, and for the first time enable you to effortlessly enjoy them every day.”
The system consists of an intelligent curation and delivery service, and SmartFrame, a revolutionary reimagining of the digital picture frame.
Fireside Creates a Personal Family Channel
The Fireside app effortlessly brings all of a family’s photos and videos together to a private, secure place in the cloud, and makes them searchable. Then, Fireside’s cloud service uses contextual computing and machine learning to automatically curate and organize libraries of thousands of photos, showing families the content they actually want to see.
For example:
- If it’s your son’s birthday, Fireside shows him photos of his past birthdays.
- If it’s your anniversary, Fireside will show you video from your wedding and honeymoon.
- If it’s cold outside, Fireside can show you skiing and holiday photos.
Photos and Videos Are Part of Your Home with Fireside SmartFrame
Fireside SmartFrame is a complete reinvention of the digital picture frame. It connects to users’ iOS/Android devices and the cloud to seamlessly integrate their curated content into everyday life. Like art or music, Fireside creates a unique and personal visual ambience that sets an emotional tone in any room.
SmartFrame is designed to blend into the home. Taking inspiration from furniture and lighting, SmartFrame is crafted with authentic materials such as glass, melamine, chrome and copper–and features a rotating stand mechanism to support both standing on a mantle or hanging on the wall. With its design and continuous delivery of relevant content, Fireside gives families a place to gather and share great memories.
After two years of development and extensive beta testing, Fireside found that 80% of users said they had switched from photo to video as their default capture mode. “Since we got Fireside I feel more likely to take videos than I was before, because we get to see them,” said beta customer Thad White. And beta customer Gordon Rios commented that “I’m getting a lot more out of my photos than I’ve ever gotten before.”
“With technologies like fast processors, high resolution displays, a camera on every device and endless memory in the cloud, the time is now for a company like Fireside to solve the dilemma of the hidden snapshots in the digital shoebox,” said Dr. Jon Peddie industry analyst with Jon Peddie Research (JPR). “By unifying all of our digital assets and making them ubiquitous across devices and platforms, the potential for new ways of experiencing our content is endless.”
SmartFrame runs Android and features a Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro Quad-core 1.7GHz, 802.11 b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth 4.0 with BLE, and a 15″ LED-backlit 1080p display with IPS technology. Playlists update over WiFi in the background, and to prevent buffering and playback issues, all photos and videos play locally from 64GB of local eMMC storage.
Starting at $399 (US) and available in both black and white, Fireside is launching on Kickstarter today and will be available through Tuesday, December 2nd. For more information, visit backfireside.com.
About Fireside
Fireside makes enjoying your photos and video as easy as taking them. Fireside brings together software, services, and hardware to deliver the world’s first complete solution for enjoying photos and video. With SmartFrame, Fireside reinvented the digital photo frame to bring your photos and video effortlessly into your home.
facebook.com/MyFireside
twitter.com/MyFireside
Fireside is a trademark or registered trademark of Fireside, Inc. All other products and services may be trademarks or service marks of their respective owners.
Photos/Multimedia Gallery Available: http://www.businesswire.com/multimedia/home/20141028005353/en/
Stowe Consulting
Kim Stowe, 408-839-8750
kim@stoweconsulting.com
