By Andrew Liszewski
I come from a big family that has become spread out over the years and of course we all like to keep in touch as much as possible. While email and IM have made this a lot easier (and a lot cheaper) there are unfortunately those family members who haven’t “learned computers” yet and probably never will.
The people who created Presto had a similar situation which led them to develop their service. Basically those less tech-savvy kinfolk would have this printer setup somewhere at home connected to a phone line. The printer would then periodically dial-in to a private email account at a set schedule, download new messages or photos and then print them off.
I’m a bit curious as to whether or not this service can deal with the eventual spam that could make its way in to the email account. I know there are plenty of spam messages I get that I just shrug off that would probably be a bit surprising to other family members.
The Presto service should be available in the fall of this year just in time for the holidays and the Presto HP printer will retail for about $150.
Andrew,
Thank you for covering Presto’s new and exciting product. I want to reassure that Presto users will be totally protected from spam and other emailable unmentionables because Presto only delivers messages from the people you approve. A key part of the online Presto Service is a list of ‘Presto Friends’ — the people allowed to send messages to your printing mailbox. It’s a ‘white list’ if you will. Messages sent from people not on your Presto Frinds list simply don’t get through.
Hope this helps — and thanks again for covering Presto!
Joe Seither
Presto
I have a family member who has a computer but just doesn’t regularly check e-mail. Can this also be used as the printer they can print to locally (i.e., USB printer)?
I think this is a great idea because we have some grandparents that do not know how to use a computer and live a few thousand miles away from us and we just had a baby. I am curious though, once you buy this printer and hook it to the phone line, is there another charge for the service or is that part of the cost of the $150?? How does this work?
While an interesting concept, you would be better off getting granny an MSNTV2 for the same price or less. Not only will she get email without a computer, but she could also surf the net and its broadband capable..
So my question is – how does the relative with no computer add friends?
call presto and they can add them.
The price is ok and I think that lots of people will find it useful. This time, HP managed to market a useful product that can actually help a large variety of people.
____________________________________________________
Locking Mailboxes
The price is ok and I think that lots of people will find it useful. This time, HP managed to market a useful product that can actually help a large variety of people.
____________________________________________________
Locking Mailboxes