As the first ever mobile copy service, Qipit was launched in September of 2006 on the foundation of its predecessor and beta version, Click2Scan.  Click2Scan was first introduced in early 2005 at the 3GSM World Congress, premiering what has since become a clear and growing market.

For the last three years, users of the Qipit service enjoyed the highest quality mobile scanning service at no charge, from any camera phone. During this time, we thoroughly enjoyed serving the community that developed around the service. Since launching the mobile copy industry, we have been driven by a single, obsessive quest: to provide the best quality, easiest to use service for making copies of documents and other types of printed or written information while outside the office.

The evolution of the mobile phone industry at large has met our expectations. Handsets have grown (much) more powerful, and the cameras have steadily improved their vision, to a point where a significant portion of the new phones shipped now feature autofocus and at least 2 megapixels in resolution. This has led us to explore alternatives models for delivering the best Qipit value to our users:

Recently, we have been working closely with enterprises to provide them with a mobile copy solution that match their needs for a robust service that is easy to integrate in their I.T. solutions and provides best-of-class copies to support their key business processes. This is necessarily very different from the existing qipit.com free service, and has proven an exiting opportunity for the technology.

Back in September of this year, we launched our first iPhone application, Qipit White. This was the first step towards our new strategy. Qipit White, does all of the processing on the handset instead of sending images to the Qipit server for processing. In our opinion, this provides a much better user experience, reducing processing time down to 5-10 seconds, from at least one minute when using a server based solution. In addition, Qipit White features improved connectivity to other services and tools.

Qipit White is positioned as a white board capture tool (OK, and flipcharts, too). This way, iPhone users can use it regardless of their generation of iPhone device (only the iPhone 3GS has an autofocus; close-up pictures of documents shot with the original iPhone or with the 3G model will be blurred (due to out-of-focus) and therefore will provide poor quality copies of documents). We will soon follow up with new applications for document copy, on the iPhone followed by the other popular smart phone platforms.

What does this mean for the Qipit online service and its users?

Starting today (October 21, 2009), the Qipit online service at www.qipit.com no longer accepts new user registrations.

Our existing users will be able to use the service as normal until November 9, 2009, at which time the ability to create new qipit copies (whether using web upload, Facebook applications, Shozu, copy@qipit.com, or color@qipit.com) and to share (by sending faxes and emails) will be discontinued.

On December 2, 2009, the service will be taken offline.

We encourage users to download to your computer all of the information you would like to keep, prior to this date. You can do this by clicking on “Veiw PDF” in the MY Documents section of the website then saving the PDF, or by simply emailing a copy to yourself using the “Email It” function.

After the shutdown, all users copies stored on our servers will not be accessible any more.

To our users, I want to say thank you for helping us build this service. We have learned much on this journey together. We will take the lessons learned from the past three years, to create even more useful smart phone applications for you.

To all of the bloggers, vloggers , podcasters, tweeters, reporters, radio show hosts, book and magazine authors, who took the time to spread the word about our service, I want to extend a heart felt thank you. There is no greater honor than having your service touted by others on TV in books, blogs, newspapers, magazines, videos and radio shows. Receiving an alert that Qipit was featured in the some form of media is always a thrill and an honor. We could not have grown this service without your help. We are hopeful; you will find our smart phone applications useful and you will continue your support of Qipit.

As always, we welcome your thoughts and comments.

Thanks,

~ Conrad

As iPhone sales continue to grow, we are seeing more and more iPhone users of Qipit. Having the ability to copy, scan and fax from anywhere, and to keep the flow of the meeting by capturing whiteboard notes on-the-spot, is a natural fit for the hip and savvy iPhone user.

One question we see, is how to get the iPhone working smoothly using the Qipit service. Depending on which iPhone you are using, your capabilities are a little different, so let′s start by defining the capabilities of the different iPhone models.

iPhone and iPhone 3G

The original iPhone and the iPhone 3G, both have 2 megapixel fixed focus cameras so they are great for capturing whiteboards, flipcharts, paperboards and other large format displays of information. They are also good for some larger handwritten notes. However, both of these models fall a little short for sending faxes and scanning documents because of the absence of the ability to change the focal point of the lens to take a clear close up picture.

There is however, an innovative solution for this problem, available from Griffin Technology called the Clarifi. The Clarifi is a protective case, with a macro focus lens that is optimized for capturing documents. Think of the Clarifi as a trendy pair of glasses for your iPhone or iPhone 3G that enables your phone to be fully compatible with all of the functionality of Qipit.

iPhone 3Gs

The iPhone 3Gs, comes equipped with a 3 megapixel autofocus camera, so there is not a need for a third party macro focus lens such as the Clarifi. This means the 3Gs will work great for scanning documents, flyers, magazine articles, receipts, forms, whiteboards and flipcharts, you name it. The next step is configuring your iPhone to work with Qipit.

Email Setup

If you did not setup your iPhone email address when you first registered, you can add this address under My Account, then click Email Settings and select Add Email Address. Make sure you confirm the email address by clicking the link that is sent to your email account. Once this is done, I suggest you add Qipit as a contact in your address book and add the Qipit email address: copy@qipit.com (for black and white copies) and color@qipit.com (for color copies). This will make it easy to use Qipit in the future.

Tip: You can add an “a” in front of the Qipit name (ie “a Qipit”), to keep Qipit at the top of your contacts list.

Note: Since the iPhone is setup to use email, there is not a need to setup your phone number unless you want to use Qipit with MMS (aka Picture Messaging). I advise against using MMS, since it may downsize your image (Read more on image downsizing below).

Taking the picture

After you have setup your iPhone, the next step is to capture the information you want to copy or fax by taking a picture of it. You can also reference the post Receiving a clear qipit document in 4 easy steps for more on that subject.

Sending full resolution photos to Qipit

The next step is getting the photo off of your iPhone at the maximum resolution. Typically Qipit needs 1,000,000 pixels (or 1 megapixel) of resolution to process an image; however this is the minimum and would not accommodate replicating very densely packed content. The type of content density you typically find in a 12 point font printed document or magazine article.

For maximizing the iPhone you want to send the full resolution image to the Qipit server to be process. This full resolution is 3,145,728 pixels (2048×1536) on the iPhone 3Gs and 1,920,000 pixels (1600 x 1200) on the original iPhone and the iPhone 3G.  If you follow the natural path of taking a picture, then simply tapping the Share button, you will only be sending a measly 480,000 pixels (800 x 600) image. Yep, your 2 or 3 megapixel image is not even sent as a full megapixel. So, to get around this obstacle (You will need iPhone OS 3.0 or later), you simply use the copy and paste feature on the phone.

Hold down on either the thumbnail of the image in the camera roll, or directly on the image and “Copy” will appear.

Touch “Copy” and it will turn blue. This copies the full-sized image to the clipboard. Now compose a new email and hold down until “Paste” appears. Touch “Paste” and it will insert the full-sized image into the new email.

Another option is to use the Share button in Album view, this option also allows you to send more than one photo at a time. This is very handy for sending a multiple page fax or document. Both methods allow you to send a full sized image from your phone, maximizing the capabilities of Qipit and the usefulness of your iPhone.

Please share any more tips and tricks you have found using Qipit and your iPhone.

(Special thanks to our friends at lifehacker for bringing the copy and paste iPhone trick to our attention)

~ Conrad

P.S. If you have an iPhone, be sure to checkout our Qipit White iPhone application. It is an even more convenient way to copy and share whteboards and flipcharts.

You′ve just completed an hour long session on the whiteboard, creating the formula to cure cancer, the elusive unified theory of everything, the killer business model or maybe it was a masterpiece of whiteboard art.

Now how do you save it, share it or even print it? Enter your iPhone and Qipit White.

Qipit White is a new application for your iPhone that allows you to copy and share whiteboards and flipcharts in a snap. The application takes that dark, hard to read iPhone picture, removes unwanted shadows, glare, whitens the background and enhances the colors of your writing. The result is a fully transformed ink-on-white digital copy of your original creation.

Now you can easily collaborate with colleagues, share it with your friends and family, save it for future reference or print it as a handout for the next meeting. All from the convenience of a device that you know and is always with you, your iPhone.

Here is how it works:

Once you have downloaded the Qipit White iPhone Application from the Apple App Store on your iPhone, iPhone 3G, iPhone 3G S or iPod Touch¹, then you are ready to begin.

Launch the application by tapping the Qipit White icon on your phone.

Take a picture of the whiteboard, greyboard, copyboard, flip chart or paperboard. The application will immediately begin to transform the photo as seen in this screen shot below.

Then presto! In just a few moments you have a highly legible digital copy of your information. Notice how the glare, shadows and that dark tint has been removed. Your left with just the information you need and none of the baggage you get from just a photo.

Next you can easily share your copy as a PDF or a picture by pressing the appropriate button. A copy is automatically saved to your iPhone, so can can press cancel to make the next copy.

You can also, access and manage all of your digital copies at any time.

If you are already familiar with the free Qipit (www.qipit.com) mobile online service, you may be thinking what is the difference? Qipit White is fully independent from any server side processing. It transforms the photograph into the qipit copy, directly on the handset. Qipit on the other hand, processes your photos on our servers and saves a copy online plus much more. Both products use our patented and award winning scanning engine and benefit from the reliability, knowledge and expertise you would expect from the the inventors of the mobile copy industry.

We are very excited about Qipit White and believe it is an essential collaboration and archival companion for whiteboards and flipcharts. I hope you will find it as useful as we do. If you have any thoughts or ideas on how to make it even better, please let us know.

Thanks,

~ Conrad

President Obama′s most recent “teachable moment” got me thinking about those “clickable moments” in life. A moment when I need to share a document, a whiteboard, a magazine article or even a flip chart with a large group of people quickly, but I don′t have the time. I only have a few moments, to get things done.

Just like everyone else, I′m always on the move. The last thing I want to do is retype everything from a whiteboard or try to find a traditional scanner to copy an article, then convert it to a PDF and email it. That′s when the Qipit publish feature comes in handy, with just a click and a moment I’m able to publish the information at hand.  With a click of my thumb on my camera phone, I capture whatever I need, then I send it to Qipit. A few clicks later, I’m published on the web with a unique URL. I can even share it on my favorite social media service or blog it with ease by embedding my qipit in my blog post like this:

Here’s how you can publish and share your qipits in 4 easy steps.

Please share your “clickable moments” or let us know if you have any questions about getting published using Qipit.

~ Conrad

We are happy to announce, Qipit won the Top Company Award at the Silicon Valley Wireless Development Summit!

During the Entrepreneur Showcase hosted by the The Telecom Council of Silicon Valley, Qipit was voted as the product creating the most shareholder value.  We are thrilled and have to agree!

Our very own Oliver Ricordel, VP of Product Management, presented Qipit for the Enterprise, you can watch the livestream here, fast forward to 41:30 to see the presentation on Qipit for the Enterprise.

Let us know if you think Qipit for the Enterprise can help your business.

~ Conrad