IT giant Hewlett-Packard announced it will open its Snapfish photo-sharing and online personal publishing API as part of Snapfish Publisher, a new initiative enabling software developers, designers and printing partners to create and market creative designs, merchandise and services optimized for the desktop and mobile platforms. According to HP, the worldwide Snapfish network now boasts more than 85 million registered users; Snapfish Publisher will offer access to this market, supplying the technical specifications necessary to upload concepts and offer designs for sale.
This summer, HP will introduce new templates for greeting cards, followed by photo books--later in the year, it will call on developers to upload and market apps for personal publishing products. HP notes the open Snapfish platform will roll out in phases and over time evolve into three primary storefronts built to meet the respective needs of its designer, developer and printing partners.
Earlier this year, Snapfish released a free mobile application optimized for Apple's iPhone platform, enabling users to upload photos from their smartphone to their Snapfish account, share images with contacts in their address book and view all of the albums and photos in their account. The Snapfish website notes that Symbian and BlackBerry apps are in the works.
For more on Snapfish Publisher:
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