Photo Sharing-Shutterfly.com

I am continuing my discussion of photo sharing sites. Like my friend Bill said in his comments about my last post: "You get what you pay for." His reference to godaddy.com is pretty incredible price for web hosting. So while the "you get what you pay for" addage is mostly true, photo sharing sites today have much to offer for free! And then have even more to offer at a fair price.

http://www.shutterfly.com
My wife turned me on to Shutterfly when she decided to take a step into digital scrapbooking. Shutterfly, Inc. is a photo sharing website that was founded in 1999 by Netscape and Silicon Graphics founder James Clark. It provides a digital photo printing service to customers. In response to market changes in recent years, Shutterfly now offers other products, such as customized calendars and greeting cards. Shutterfly also offers a free download photo editor: http://www.shutterfly.com/studio/overviews.jsp

Here is their limit policy:

For our customers, we offer free, unlimited storage: we will let you store as
many pictures as you wish, with no fee to upload or store your pictures. All
pictures, whether uploaded digitally or from our 35mm film service, will be kept
in your account until you delete them yourself. (Please note that Shutterfly
reserves the right to modify this policy if necessary.)

We also offer a service called Shutterfly Pro Galleries, where you can sell prints online, naming your own price-- with discounted printing provided by Shutterfly. For Pro Galleries, we offer hosted storage for an annual fee, with storage levels starting at 5 GB for the Pro plan and unlimited storage for the Premier plan. Please note that the storage limit is based upon the files posted to your galleries at a single
time. For more information, please see our Pro Galleries page at: http://www.shutterfly.com/progallery

Shutterfly does not currently have a maximum file size limit. We do encourage customers to keep image file sizes to within reason (usually under 10 megs, as there is no added benefit in terms of our printing with larger sizes).

The thing that sets Shutterfly apart from Photobucket (besides less ads!) is that Shutterfly allows you to order prints-You upload your digital pictures then merely order prints to be delivered by mail. Another VERY cool feature at shutterfly is that they have a very simple-to-use interface that allows you to create a photo album-a real-honest-to goodness book, one that you can hold in your hand! One of the presents I got this year was my very own photo album. Shuterfly allows you to choose the layout, pick your pics, create captions or even create a story line and then you submit an order and in a few days you get a bound book delivered to your doorstep. Pretty cool!

Here is a digital version of a book made for grandma: http://share.shutterfly.com/action/project/2AasWbZi4asWEv/landing

Stats at a glance for http://www.shutterfly.com/ :

• Cost: Free with ads for shutterfly services (less external ads)
• Upgrade: none
• Storage: unlimited
• Software: Shutterfly Studio (free download)
• What sets this site apart: The ability to oder prints and other simple proiducts.

Next time I will talk about snapfish.com Check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photo_sharing for more info on photo sharing.

-Durk-