Every once in awhile, someone integrates existing technologies in a way that clearly makes life better in simple, clear ways. I think that Kodak has done so with their EasyShare-One camera. Wired News reports it well in, Death of the Digital Middleman
After a summer-long delay, Kodak has begun shipping the first digital camera with Wi-Fi technology that will allow consumers to send photos directly to friends and family by e-mail without a computer.
Owners of the new EasyShare-One, priced at $600, can send photos through a Wi-Fi transmitter at home or work, or pay $5 a month to connect the camera with any of T-Mobile USA’s 6,000 hot spots at stores, airports, hotels and other establishments.
I, like virtually everyone else that I know, take zillions of pictures that I would like to share with friends but I rarely get around to it. I have been tempted by the camera phones that can zip photos off to unwitting victims via the cell phone network but have been put off by two factors. First, the photo quality is appalling, and, second, the photo quality is appalling. (Yes, I admit it. I’m a snob when it comes to picture quality.)
Pictures taken with most digital cameras now rival the ones taken with film cameras, at least for 4×6 snapshots. The cost and convenience of “developing” the digital pictures is comparable to that of developing and printing a roll of film.
Kodak’s innovation, though, is in giving us a truly new convenience feature that is not possible with film. I can’t wait to see what comes next.
