Family Share: An Update

The response from yesterday’s post about my new project, (working title: Family Share) has been fantastic. We’ve got an array of VIP founder members lined up — there’s still space if you’re interested.

I’ve got a heck of a lot of ideas from everyone. And most interestingly, no one has actually emailed to say ‘er, look, there’s a company doing exactly what you’ve suggested’.

I’m sure somebody, somewhere, is already doing something like this. Or something almost exactly the same. This is the nature of the planet. Almost every idea you come up with has usually been thought of, tried, or considered by somebody else. I did an inordinate amount of searching prior to committing to ‘Family Share’. I found absolutely nothing that did precisely what I wanted.

I’ve written the first specification and I’m engaged in hiring the web developer at the moment. My first approach is to sort out the web bit. And I’m thinking very much of taking a leaf out of the Facebook gallery user-interface. I really like how they’ve done that.

So we’ll need to create the image and video gallery features, then we’ll need to get the user system, registration and the like operational.

Once it’s possible to create an account and upload some photo and video — and be able to display and organise it nicely — I then need to turn my attention to the mobile side of things.

I’m thinking iPad and iPhone, primarily. I got an email from one reader who’s not only keen to become a founding VIP member, he’s also a dab hand at Android programming. So we’ll get an Android client out too.

Ed Hodges of Touchnote called yesterday to briefly demand why I was limiting the potential audience to only people with iPads. “What about the legions of folk with PCs?”

He does have a point. Ed suggested looking at an Adobe Air client too. I’ve put that on the list, Ed.

I also talked with Pibbix‘s Dan Lane yesterday who rubbished the whole concept by modifying it and taking it into an entirely new paradigm. Unfortunately Dan’s underlying suggestion will need $10m or so to do properly. But it’ll be ridiculously successful. And that needs some rather substantial ‘friends and family’ investment. So if you’d like to discuss, I’m all ears. I need to talk to my investor contacts about that one, Dan.

Meanwhile it’s all ahead full. I will have an update for you all within the next few days once we’ve got the developer on board.

If you’ve got any ideas or suggestions for the concept, feel free to contribute or drop me a note.