One of the chief differences between StoryBot and other photo organization programs is the ease with which it finds and stores your photos. A key design criteria is that all StoryBot questions are simple and easy to answer for everyone. There should also be a clear action for any "I Don't Know" response.

After installation, StoryBot will simply ask where you keep your digital photos (question), or offer to search your hard drive (action for "i don't know"). Many people will simply uses Window's "My Pictures." Others will have a special place for them. Still others will have photos spread all over the place. StoryBot needs to determine the "folder sources" right up front, then search those folders, and sub-folders, for any photos.

After searching, StoryBot will ask whether the user would like to 1) link to the existing photos, 2) copy the photos to StoryBot's folder structure, 3) move the photos to StoryBot's folder structure. This is likely to be a confusing question for many people, but it's important to know .... LINK, MOVE, or COPY.

Afterwards, StoryBot will remember the folders where it found photos, even if all the photos have been moved out. We should assume that people have other photo programs, and they don't know how to configure them to put their new photos in the new central location. So whenever StoryBot starts, it'll search the old locations for new photos, again asking if it should LINK, MOVE, or COPY any new photos it finds.

Ultimately, the goal is for people to forget where their photos are located. All they need to know is that there somewhere on their computer and that StoryBot knows where to find them.

As I sit at my mother's desk, watching the sun rise over the ridge behind our house, still able to shine through the trees as we are only days into spring, I'm done with my prep, I've scheduled the time, I've made the comittment. Now sits before me a book of blank pages, with only my instincts and a few good but old ideas to guide me:

What do I want to make?

We'll start, as all things do, with im. People will start storybot with confidence that it will automatically find their digital photos and video, whether from a connected camera or scanner, email inbox, hard disk, or disc. My first task is getting the software to find your photos, your music, your movies. I'll start with photos.

The idea for StoryBot began in January 1999 while trying to teach my mom, Rosemary, how to email photos taken with her new Kodak digital camera. The software that came with it was called PictureEasy, and was pretty easy. Of the two dozen photo programs I've used since, it was probably the best for her, but it still had some snags that tripped her up from time to time.

Over the next few years, whenever we went to Florida for a visit, I'd download a bunch of new photo programs to see if anyone had made something easier than PictureEasy. As I imagined my mom learning and using each program, I knew from my teaching sessions where she'd have trouble. Without fail, these other programs assumed you already knew how you wanted to organize everything. They assumed you were comfortable using files and folders, which is something my mom never quite understood.

Being a software developer, I decided that if I couldn't find a photo program good enough for my mom, I'd make one. In the summer of 2000, I systematically compared all the programs I'd researched, boiled them down to their bare essence, did a lot of blank-page brainstorming while wandering around Musikfest, and began designing a program my mother would really like.

Unfortunately, the demands of the day took precedence, leaving my designs on paper. In January 2002, while in Florida, I researched the market potential for such a program and became very motivated as I read the stats on the increasing popularity of digital cameras. I even started a prospectus in hopes of finding some backers to help finance development, though as usual, my attention returned to client work when I went back to Pennsylvania. Yet again, Rosie's program went back on the shelf.

On my last trip to Florida, two months ago, my mother died unexpectedly. Words fail to describe what I feel, but I can say this: all that client work that seemed more important than my mom's photo program doesn't seem all that important right now. So, for the next fifteen weeks, my top work priority is making the program designed with my mom in mind. StoryBot is dedicated to her.

Today, on the 5th anniversary of Immuexa, we're starting a project.

StoryBot(tm) will be a desktop application that helps people make memories. It'll find, transfer, and store your digital photos & video. It'll ask you about each, letting you tell the who, what, where, and when of it. It'll then let you browse and relate everything in a manner very simliar to the way we already think. When you're ready to share your memories, StoryBot makes it easy to upload everything to our companion web application product, StoryMill(tm).

Our goal is to launch the first version of StoryBot on July 4th, 2003. Till then, there's fifteen weeks, with 20 hours budgeted per week for a total of 300 hours. This blog will chronicle our progress, so stay tuned.