Some people eat, sleep and chew gum, I do genealogy and write...

Friday, December 25, 2015

Further Update on Innovator Summit Finalists

Since I wrote my last post, I received a comment from my friend, Louis Kessler, giving me a link to the complete list of submissions. Here is the link: http://rootstech.devpost.com/submissions. Thanks to Louis for this help.

Here are links and comments to the apps that I could not find in my first go-around. Please note that the comments added for each of the apps is a copied from their website or other promotional material. In some cases, I may have added a few comments of my own. Please see, "Semi-Finalist pool reduced to 22 in Innovator Showdown for RootsTech 2016" for the rest of the list. Please also note that the Chatteroo program is really "KID CHATTEROO."

Goze
Goze is a mobile app where people can capture their life journey through photo, videos and unlimited text. Goze lets you create shared events by adding contributors. You can also control privacy by event by simply selecting which friends of family you want to see each event or, keep some completely to yourself. You can also keep them completely private. For those who want a physical way to share their memories, you can export into photobooks and/or on DVDs. Goze exhibits your life journey and you are the curator. 
Goze will change the way families and individuals record their life history by providing an easy and accessible way to record life's greatest moments on the go. By incorporating a social media element (optional, of course), Goze provides a safe, private place where one can keep all their personal and private memories. 
Families can collaborate on recording memories of their ancestors or their young families - all in one place. Because Goze is event-based, an simple API to Family Search or Family Tree would make exporting for other purposes simple. People will be doing their personal and family history and not even now it!
JRNL
The original concept was developed by the Company's founder, Nick Jones, while looking for a better way to journal. From his own experience, and from countless interviews with highly successful people, Nick understood the many benefits of keeping a personal record of one's daily life and experiences.
Unfortunately, after testing every well-known journaling product available, Nick struggled to find a platform that fit his needs. Specifically, he wanted a solution that was:
Portable (available for both Web and mobile)
  • Easy to use
  • Easy to manage
  • Flexible (supporting multiple platforms, email integrations, etc.)
  • Designed to handle both public and private journal types
  • Built with features to simplify collaboration and sharing of public entries
  • Capable of exporting content or publishing to a hardbound book
At JRNL, we believe that Life is Worth Recording, and that by keeping and reflecting upon past experiences, we can better address future challenges.
JRNL was built to record life’s memorable moments as they happen. With solutions available for both Web and mobile, and an easy to use input interface, JRNL lets users record their thoughts, upload content, and reflect on past entries and experiences no matter the time or the place. In addition to private journaling, users can share content and collaborate with others to create a more complete record of events, history, projects and interests. 
JRNL goes well beyond basic journal creation and documentation, providing helpful prompts and reminders to motivate users to document key events, milestones and historic moments. In addition, the platform provides for the organization and production of any journal into a personalized, beautifully crafted hardbound book.
Kindex
While sorting and scanning our grandmother’s collection of personal papers, we were overwhelmed in a sea of letters, diaries, photos, and other personal documents. As we pored over the handwritten pages, we realized we needed a solution beyond just digitizing. 
Already avid indexers and family historians, we envisioned a tool that enables individuals, families, and organizations to index and tag their own histories—letters, journals, and other personal records—resulting in an accessible, searchable, archive. With the power indexing has to bridge generations, cross religious and cultural boundaries, and unite people, we became determined to bring family collections of written documents out of obscurity through indexing. These documents—replete with names, places, and stories—will enrich a family’s history, connect records to researchers, and fuel the find for historians everywhere. 
Through the Kindex™ web app, users create a “Kindex”—a living archive where anyone can contribute, index, and share family records. Families may establish their two-generation Kindex™ using FamilySearch account, which provides a foundation of family names for your Kindex™. As records are gathered and attached to family names, they can be indexed privately within families or released as public indexing projects. Our indexing tool employs a simple side-by-side user interface where the user enters indexes the record and applies tags. Once approved by a family administrator, completed indexing becomes accessible and searchable through tools such as search engines, Kindex™ and FamilySearch, and other family history partners. Within Kindex™, users may also read indexed records, attach them as FamilySearch Memories, search their content, share on social media, or print to paper or PDF.
Little Family Tree
Thanks to the Finlays for sending me a link to their program. Here is their characterization of the program. Here is a link to their website. Little Family Tree
The youngest children are just beginning to learn family relationships and are often interested in who they are and how they are connected to their family and the world at large. However, family history information and stories are rarely shared in a way that young children understand or find interesting. 
Today's children intuitively understand how to use touch devices such as smartphones and tablets. They use them to play, watch, and learn. The objective of Little Family Tree is to bring a child's personal family history to them through this learning medium and to share it in a way that is accessible to them. 
Little Family Tree engages toddlers and pre-school children with their personal family history through games and activities designed for their level. (Most of the games are fun for the kid in all of us.) Personal family history data and photos are obtained by having an adult login to an online family tree such as FamilySearch or PhpGedView. An online family tree account is required to play the game but a FamilySearch account can be obtained for free at FamilySearch.org. Data is loaded in the background allowing the child to explore and play immediately. 
Playing with Little Family Tree will help children learn to:
  • Identify family members by name, relationship, and picture
  • Understand who and where they come from
  • Recognize and navigate a family tree
Little Family Tree currently includes the following games: 

My Family App
This app was inspired by our own families and our need connect and to preserve our own family histories. The design was inspired by the simplicity of the "My Family: Stories That Bring Us Together" booklet released by FamilySearch.org in November 2013. 
The My Family app uses a modern design and many state-of-the-art mobile technologies to connect families and preserve their past. It helps them communicate with each other and stay in-touch. It also helps families collect, organize and share their family pictures, stories and history. In addition, it creates great looking PDF books that can be printed and professionally bound.
Perspectives
Any time my family gets together... the story of broken arms, sleepwalking over thanksgiving at grandma's in '96, mom driving the beamer into a pond, etc. get retold… and each time someone is interrupted with waves of “no, that’s not what happened” and other corrections. 
Through these amazing, emotion-filled family events, I’ve learned that one moment, experienced by many, can produce multiple versions of the story— each valid, real, and valuable in their own way. I realized that listening to each perspective told firsthand made the overall story even more enjoyable. 
I thought it would be great to capture a single moment from everyone’s perspective.
Perspectives is a grandparent-friendly mobile app that enables collaborative storytelling without interruptions.
WeGather
weGather is a free, purpose-driven app that helps families capture the stories behind old analog photos in a fun, social way. Rather than focusing on digitization and storage, weGather focuses on story collection using the power of crowdsourcing. weGather is narrowly-scoped, launching with a focused feature set that's optimized for mobile devices. We're creating an app that's fun to use and most important, gets multiple family members involved quickly!
If any of the developers want to add any further information, it would be more than welcome.

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