synch or swim?

[patfromberg]

Well, maybe it's about time somebody posted a thread here.

I'm starting to hear the tiniest little whispers about synching photos from your Win Mobile to your p.c. folders to the Net, etc. You know, make a change in one of them (even when you're off-line?) and the change will automatically synch up to the others. A lot of these whispers have the name Sharpcast attached to them.

It's a very new company and from what I've read it sounds promising. But I wonder what the reaction is here, in the trenches, if you will. What's your opinion? Are we still light years away, or has synching finally arrived? And is this as important as some people are making it sound?

Pat

[karmajex]

Fair warning: this is about to get kinda theoretical.

The current sharpcast application is, by itself, not very important. There are certainly enough photo enthusiasts, not to mention graphic designers, out there who will make this a successful product -- and who will get it for free for long enough that they're hooked and will eventually therefore pay for the application after at least a few generations of the product, and who will therefore get it on the road to profitability. Right now, it's an infant of a company, not even syncing on Macs yet, but what it could grow up to be might be huge.

What we're talking about, in the *very* long run, is Web 2.0. Go beyond the photo application, extend the idea to all applications. Why make changes to a particular document, or image, or mpeg file, or music collections or photo albums in one computer and have to make the exact same change to your mobile devices or other computers? What this is promising is the synchronization of all applications, and not necessarily web-based. For example, I carry all my work documents in a jump drive to and from my office and home computers; it's better than e-mailing everything to myself over and over again, but it would be a total disaster if I lost the thing. If I could sync all my documents, then this would be no problem -- the changes I made on one computer would instantly occur on the other computer. It's simple and brilliant at the same time; the problem has been changing it from an idea to an actuality.

The current photo application, then, is just a baby step. If they can do it successfully, though, and transition into other and all applications, it's hugely important.

There. Theorizing finished. What are everyone's thoughts on the matter?

karmajex