Family Photo Sharing Made Easy With Familio

Despite being the world’s number one photo sharing site, Facebook is still lacking when it comes to sharing photos with select groups, such as family member. Familio, an Israeli startup, is trying a different approach. The company offers a cross-platform way of sharing photos with family members in a social network designed specifically for that. The service is available on a website, as a browser plugin and as an app for iOS and Android devices.

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“In order to make this product work, you have to make it agnostic of the platform or devices that your family is using,” CEO Iftach Yair tells TechCrunch. “If you’re going to build a product for iPhones or Android, and look away from the desktop, then you’ll be leaving a good chunk of your family aside, and that will make your product unsuccessful.”

Familio has a fairly simple interface, which enables family members to easily upload photos and videos. Users can comment on photos and “like” them as well. In addition, users can share photos from their group with members of other groups, so even if a family member is not part of someone else’s group, you can still share photos of your family with them.

Currently, the platform enables sharing high-resolution photos and videos, but in the future, Familio says that it will be possible to share other content. For obvious reasons, all content can be posted on Facebook from within the platform.

“Only 15 percent of photos are viewed on Facebook”

One of the things Familio is trying to achieve is making sure nobody misses the photos you share. “Some people think that by sharing on Facebook, everyone sees the photos, but the reality is that because of the Facebook graph, only around 15 percent of photos are viewed at any time,” Yair claims (we weren’t able to verify this).

Moreover, when it comes to privacy, many people are not comfortable with sharing photos of their children on public platforms like Facebook or Instagram, and even if they did, the content has the potential to reach many more people other than their intended audience. “I don’t want to spam everyone with photos of my son,” Yair told TechCrunch, “this is an issue…most people don’t really care about other people’s kids that much.”

The product is currently running in beta form and is free to all users. The company hopes to monetize in the future with in-app services such as photo printing and secure “lifetime storage.”

Despite the fact that most of the platform’s features can be achieved on existing services, including Facebook and Dropbox, Familio’s interface is an easy way for family members, including grandma and grandpa, to share and (so far limitlessly) store photos and videos.

Photo by Familio