Comcast Enables Customers to Become Directors of Their Own Photo Slideshows and Makes Organizing & Sharing Personal Digital Photos Easier Than Ever with the Launch of Comcast PhotoShow Deluxe

PhotoShow Deluxe is the latest built-for-broadband application now available to Comcast's 6 million High-Speed Internet customers via Comcast.net, the national #1 broadband portal

PHILADELPHIA, August 24, 2004 - Comcast, the nation's number one broadband Internet provider, announced the launch of Comcast PhotoShow Deluxe , which answers the need for a simple way to organize and share digital photos, but does it broadband-style.

Leveraging broadband's interactive power, Comcast PhotoShow Deluxe also enables users to create multimedia slideshows as a special way to share their photos. Users can literally become directors of their own photo slideshows, complete with music, transitions, animation, and clip art, to tell their stories to family and friends: babies first birthdays, what they did on their summer vacations, family reunions, and more. The result is a richer, lean-forward experience for both users and their recipients.

Comcast PhotoShow Deluxe is available through a partnership with Simple Star, a leading consumer imaging software and services company, based in San Francisco, Ca. This premium product is offered at no additional charge to all of Comcast's six million High-Speed Internet customers. This is another way Comcast is adding value as it focuses on enhanced communication along with five other key areas (sports, kids, gaming, music and movies). This announcement closely follows the announcement of another complementary communication application, Comcast Video Mail.

Even novice photo enthusiasts can quickly and easily create their own multimedia slideshows. These slideshows can then be shared online or downloaded to a CD-ROM or Video CD (VCD) for playback on TV and most DVD players.

When sent via email, the slideshows are conveniently embedded as live links, which solves the problem of overwhelmed email inboxes with large photo files. Along with the link, recipients will receive a thumbnail of the first photo within the slideshow, inviting them to view the digital slideshow. Comcast High-Speed Internet customers can send their PhotoShow slideshows to any valid email address, to users operating in a Windows or Mac environment with the free Flash player installed. The recipient of the slideshow does not need to be a Comcast High-Speed Internet customer in order to view it.

"Digital photos tend to sit on the computer hard drive, unorganized and often unshared, similar to the stacks of photos that pile up in shoeboxes around the house. Comcast PhotoShow Deluxe solves these organizational challenges by now making it easy to send and share digital photos. What's more, it takes advantage of our 100% Pure Broadband connection, providing many easy-to-use customization and interactive tools, said Greg Butz, senior vice president of marketing and business development for Comcast Online.

"In speaking with our customers, we learned that 55 percent have digital cameras, and 38 percent expressed interest in enhanced photo editing - yet less than 20 percent of them are utilizing any type of online photo tools. Advanced photo applications such as PhotoShow provide another strong opportunity for us to add value. Consumer feedback has affirmed our strategy, with comments such as: 'I'm going to want these services; it makes me think more seriously about high-speed service;' and 'I might buy a digital camera just so I could use Comcast PhotoShow Deluxe,' " Butz concluded.

More About Comcast PhotoShow Deluxe
Comcast PhotoShow is one of the most comprehensive digital photography suites available today. Its features include:
  • Photo Publishing and Sharing - users can: easily share albums and musical slideshows; burn photos and shows to CD-ROMS, as well as Video CDs (VCDs) for playback on TV; and easily publish photos to HTML.
  • Photo Editing -applications and features include: drawing and painting; control of brightness, red-eye removal, contrast and saturation; 15 professional quality filters and effects; over 100 pieces of animated clip art (with categories spanning kids, pets, nature, seasonal, parties, sports, bizarro, dress-up and more); 75 frames to add themes to photos (such as birthday, wedding and party); captions and text effects; and photo resizing.
  • Slideshow Creation - offers: one-click creation with up to 9 templates currently available; soundtrack jukebox for shared shows, with over 100 songs currently available; and animated clip art (referenced above).
  • Photo Organization and Management - applications and features include: ability to organize albums by groups; sort photos alphabetically; tag individual photos with people's names, comments and keywords; search photos by contents and tags; easily rename photos, and print high-quality photos at home.


Part of a Complete Photo Solution at Comcast.net
Comcast is packaging PhotoShow Deluxe as part of the Comcast PhotoCenter presented by Snapfish on Comcast.net. This destination is Comcast's end-to-end photo solution for its High-Speed Internet customers. The Comcast PhotoCenter offers virtually unlimited photo storage so Comcast customers can free up hard drive space on their computers and store their precious moments on a secure server. Customers can also take advantage of several special offers, such as having their first 10 prints professionally developed on Kodak paper free of charge, and additional printing for 19 cents per print. Additionally, customers can print out postage-paid mailing labels or request to have labels sent to them to send their film for professional developing. Customers interested in printing their own photos can do that as well.

For more on Comcast PhotoShow Deluxe, please visit, http://www.photoshow.net/scripts_mai...uEsd&b=comcast