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Comment by philk | Hacker News Reader

I think you're going a bit over the top by saying they've killed every photo frame company on the planet. People aren't going to buy five iPads and put them up around their house.

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I was referring to the digital frames. Maybe I'm missing something (entirely possible!) but I don't know what any other "display photos in a digital box" hardware has to offer that this doesn't.

Upvoted, among other things, for making me imagine a waterfall of iPads displaying upon them photographs of waterfalls. Unrelated imagery. Thanks!

Other "display photos in a digital box" hardware has a sub $100 pricetag, which means you can leave them around your house doing nothing but display photos without feeling guilty (or stupid).

Touche! So the digital photos won't disappear instantly. I'd bet, though, that they'll take something of a hit from this, and certainly as this thing lowers in prices they'll be hurt even further.

The point of a digital photo frame is to display photos. The point of the iPad is to do magical fun stuff. Displaying photos is just one thing it can do. I don't think it's going to do anything to the digital frame industry. A computer can also display photos, so whatever damage that has been done has already been done.

I think it's going to come down to how consumers perceive the iPad. If they see it as a simplified computer, then you're absolutely right. If, however, they start treating it like a household appliance, one that simply cuts many more specialized tools out of the picture, then I think digital photo frames might be among the ones to do. When you can call up your photos in a slideshow at any time on a machine that makes doing so feel intuitive, you might not like the programmable frame.

But, as I said, I could be wrong. My own apathy for the product certainly isn't anybody else's.

> When you can call up your photos in a slideshow at any time on a machine that makes doing so feel intuitive, you might not like the programmable frame.

I thought that point of photo frames (digital or not) was to display your photos, not to have an iPad sitting on the coffee table that has all of your photos on it ready to sift through. This is like saying that putting a photo album on your coffee table makes photos in frames obsolete.

Unless you're claiming that people will buy iPads with iPad-holsters and set them up on tables/shelves to constantly display a stream of their photos, then you haven't proved that the digital photo frame is "on it's way out."

The problem is that I never really got picture frames. I think it's weird having photos of people just randomly hanging around. Especially if it's a small screen giving me a crappy cycling photo. I'd rather have a device upon which all my family memories are stored.

But I'm the odd man out, I guess. I'd always thought digital photo frames were dead anyway; from the opposition that line got here, I guess I'm wrong! Apologies.

So basically you just wrote an article about how us nerds don't get "normal people," and in the process committed the same sin by not getting what a digital picture frame is for "normal people?" Funny

I think he doesn't get photo frames in general, not just the digital ones.

> I'd rather have a device upon which all my family memories are stored.

This has been possible with computers for what, at least 15 years now? Whether or not it's more intuitive on an iPad is subjective. But as far as having it all stored digitally, a computer can already do that.

The thing the iPad revolutionizes about photos is that it allows you to walk around with it around the house.

And give them to your employees as gifts. It seems like these things were just invented to be giftable.

Price - would you rather spend $50 bucks for a digital frame or $500 for an iPad to sit on a desk?

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