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Introducing Streams

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Today we’re excited to announce a major update to Shine, Sunshine’s photos app. Shine has evolved into an AI-powered private social network designed to make connecting easier and relationships stronger—all through the power of photos.

Since launching in March, we’ve explored how photo sharing, with a boost from AI, can bring people closer. Here’s what’s new:

  • Streams, your WhatsApp for Photos.  We all share photos via messaging.  The issue is that messaging was made for chatting, not photo sharing, so the photo experience is usually less than ideal – not full resolution, too many near duplicates, no easy gallery view. To optimize for photo-based chat, Shine now has streams.  Streams are essentially group chats consisting entirely of photos.  A stream could be for your family, a group trip, a classroom, a team, a night out, a dinner party, and so on.  They are like albums, but they can be infinite.  They may span a few hours or a few years.  Streams also harness AI to organize and de-duplicate photos (finding the best one).

AI Powered

  • Facial Recognition.  We’ve surveyed all the facial recognition models so you can get the benefit of the best of what is available today.  In a stream, Shine easily recognizes all the photos of a person.  Shine can even suggest who might be in the photos using the profile pictures from your contacts.  And, you can tag people and share with them in one smooth action.

  • AI Curation.  Shine’s AI curation is as powerful as ever, but now it’s even more useful.  By using the power of AI, you don’t have to spend your time picking the “best” photo and remembering who to send it to. You simply drop your photos into a stream and let Shine group near-duplicates, select a key photo, and suggest, based on facial recognition, who else you may want to share with or add to the stream.  This works particularly well with “everyday” photos that may not be bound for Instagram glory, but are still something you want to share with your family or friends.  This is where AI-powered private social networking comes in.  It’s private because it’s just your family and friends. 

  • Shareworthy suggestions.  In Shine’s first release, suggestions were one of the most loved features.  Shine users couldn’t get enough of them.  Since then, we’ve enhanced our AI’s understanding of shareworthy photos and now, because of contacts and facial recognition, you can share suggested photos even more easily with exactly who you want to.

Private and Social

  • Request photos of yourself from friends.  Within the privacy of your contacts and the power of facial recognition, Shine finds pictures of you that your friends have shared on Shine.  Shine then suggests you request those photos from your friends.

  • Private.  Social networking feeds are now filled with people you don’t even know.  Shine is focused on helping you strengthen the relationships you already have.  To do this well, Shine puts privacy at the forefront.  No photos are shared from your phone without your explicit consent.  To learn more about how Sunshine as a company and Shine as a product approach your privacy, please read our privacy pledge.
  • Integrated contacts for easier sharing.  As a company, Sunshine knows a lot about contacts.  In this release of Shine, we are building off that know-how.  With your permission, we access and analyze your contacts, deduplicate them and make it easy to invite friends to join a stream.
  • Easy sharing across iOS and Android users.  The new streams feature in Shine works well for many different-sized groups, however it’s particularly great for groups from approximately ten to a few hundred people.  One of the issues in groups of this size is that you will almost certainly have both iOS users and Android users.  This makes Apple Photos and Google Photos less than ideal.  Shine is adept on both platforms and makes sharing across OSes seamless.

The updated Shine photos app is a new chapter for Sunshine–and one we couldn’t be more excited about.  And, we are just getting started.  Give Shine a try–and give us feedback! Email us at feedback@sunshine.com so we can make Shine even better.

Introducing Streams Read More »

Introducing Shine

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“Don’t forget to send me that photo!”  How many times have you said that?  And, how often have you actually gotten the photo?  Maybe 20% of the time?  It depends on how busy your friend is, how many photos they took, whether they have your number or email, and a myriad of other factors.  The reality is photo sharing is broken.

Introducing the Shine app – easy, intuitive, group photo sharing.  With Shine, a photo belongs to a time and a place, and the people who were there. 

With the Shine app (available for free in the App Store, coming soon to Android), you get beautifully curated albums with all the photos you’ve been missing.  Shine works for future, current, and even past events (so you’ll still be able to get those photos from last year’s spring break!).  Whether you are on a trip, at a party, or just hanging out, you can get started in a few simple steps:

    1. Create an album with a time and place.  
    2. Pick your mode: Magic (uses Shine’s AI to decide what is shareworthy) or Manual (you select photos to share).
    3. Invite others to the album.

Presto!  You’ll have all the photos from when you were together.  In full resolution.  Clustered to remove duplicates.  Available to download or view in the app.  

Here’s what Shine does:

  • Photo curation.  Shine uses AI to understand which pictures are shareworthy for an album.  That means looking at where and when they were taken, who is in them, and clustering photos of the same scene or moment.  It also avoids photos that you likely don’t want to share with a group (screenshots, personal selfies).  In Magic Mode, shareworthy photos are automatically uploaded to the album and, for the photos Shine isn’t sure about, it asks you.  In Manual Mode, Shine’s AI identifies shareworthy photos.  Only when you have reviewed and approved the suggestions are your photos uploaded to our servers.
Photo curation
  • Suggested albums.  Shine also uses AI to suggest albums you may want to share.  With your permission, Shine analyzes your photos to look for patterns that indicate a group of photos you may want to share as an album.  Shine suggests these albums, grouped by time and place.  Then, with just a few taps, you can share those photos (in case you forgot to do so at the time!).  And, in return, you’ll get the photos that your friends took.
suggested albums
  • Share with ease.  Easy sharing means always getting the photo.  Shine makes it frictionless to share an album with the right group of people.  You can invite with an album code, link, or QR code.  Plus, if you’ve shared other albums before, Shine makes it easy to share with the same friends again.  You can share photos you took in the past or set up an album for the future.  Shine gives reminders about albums you’ve been invited to join, photos you’ve taken that may be shareworthy, and new photos that are shared with you.  Plus, Shine has reactions, captions, and comments built right in, so you can react to your friends’ photos and they can react to yours.  And, Shine organizes it all into a compelling activity feed on your homescreen.
share with ease

We think you will love the Shine app.  Try it today and you’ll instantly get beautiful, shareworthy albums.

And, Shine is more than just group photo sharing.  At Sunshine, we know that some of the most special photos are taken at events: parties, weddings, birthdays, backyard BBQs, conferences.  These events require organization: themes, invites, RSVPs and headcounts, updates, and messaging.  And, we also know that events where photo sharing is naturally part of the guest experience makes it easier for everyone.

So, Shine is also launching events – invites, RSVPs, messaging, and more.  Available for free at shine.sunshine.com, now you can organize your event with wit, beauty, and intelligence – with photo sharing natively built in right from the start.

What sets Shine events apart:

  • Clever, gorgeous invitations.  The best events have creative themes with originality and wit.  Generative AI can, in a matter of seconds, create an array of stunning options to define your event and build your guests’ anticipation.  With Dall-E from OpenAI integrated, you can jot down an event concept in a few words and get striking invitation options.  These rich, creative invites elevate any event.  And, you can also choose from our Inspiration Gallery or upload your own picture or design.

  • Smooth, speedy communication.  Shine is designed to be fast and fluid.  Invite your guests by email, mobile number or link.  RSVPs are clean, easy, and expressive. Shine lets your guests receive updates how they want – by text, email, or both.   We’ve thoughtfully optimized Shine, so you and your guests can focus on the event itself.

  • Built-in photo sharing.  Now participating in event photo sharing is as easy as RSVPing yes.  Every event created on Shine automatically has a shared photo album defined by the invite’s place and time.  Once you RSVP, you are added to the shared album.  All you have to do is install the Shine app.  When you are at the event, photos you take will be shared (magically or manually, in accordance with your preference) and photos other guests take will be shared with you.  And, like all Shine albums, they will be curated, clustered, and available in full resolution.

built in sharing

 

At Sunshine, we aim to make the mundane magical and make it easier to be thoughtful. 

With easy, intuitive, group photo sharing and stunning, flawlessly organized events, it’s time to Shine.  Get started today by downloading the Shine app or visiting shine.sunshine.com.

Introducing Shine Read More »

Sunshine Contacts Update (3/25/23)

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Happy Weekend!  Here’s the latest on Sunshine Contacts.

What do we do again?  Sunshine’s takes mundane tasks and make them magical.  And we’re starting with contacts.  Sunshine Contacts is your behind-the-scenes contacts brain — keeping your contacts organized, up-to-date, accurate, and syncing them to where you need them, when you need them.

What have we been up to? Sunshine Contacts and Sunshine Birthdays are available in the App Store. Early adopters are loving both (4.8+ rating).

What’s new in Contacts this week? Version 1.43 is in the App Store and it has:

New Keep in Touch functionality – Ever wonder if someone is able to get in touch with you?  Chances are they have out-of-date and partial info.  Our new Keep In Touch feature sends your up-to-date contact info to recipients — even if they aren’t Sunshine users.  Like a digital business card or a “We’ve moved” postcard, you choose the details to send and who to send it to.  Recipients get an easy to download vCard.  And, voilà!  Your contact card is up-to-date on their phone instantly.  It’s free for the first 25 cards, or $9.99 for an unlimited number of recipients.  You can access Keep in Touch from the main menu.

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Improved Sharing – We’ve made it easier than ever to share your contact info with people nearby.  Tapping on Share pops up the familiar Apple’s share sheet, so you can send contact info via AirDrop, text or email.  In just a few taps, you can share and receive contact info from someone you just met. 

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More Efficient Search – We’ve retooled our approach to search to be more effiicient in terms of storage used, time to index, and speed of search.

Sunshine in the press
This past week, Sunshine was featured this past week on CNBC’s Working Lunch and Forbes.  Watch the videos.  Thanks to Jon Fortt and Diane Brady for featuring Sunshine!

If you like Sunshine Contacts or Sunshine Birthdays, please take a moment to give us a review in the App Store.  We appreciate it!

Follow @sunshine on Twitter and LinkedIn & @brightsunshiningday on Instagram
Android is coming soon!  Sign up for our Android Waitlist

Sunshine Contacts Update (3/25/23) Read More »

Sunshine Contacts Update (3/17/23)

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An update on Sunshine Contacts from this past weekend! 

What do we do again?  Sunshine’s takes mundane tasks and make them magical.  And we’re starting with contacts.  Sunshine Contacts is your behind-the-scenes contact brain — keeping your contacts organized, up-to-date, accurate, and syncing them to where you need them, when you need them.

What have we been up to?  We learned a lot from the v1 release of our contacts product.  Last August, we “soft launched” our v2.  Customers love it, and we have maintained a 4.8 rating in the App Store: Sunshine Contacts in the App Store. We also launched Sunshine Birthdays, more about that below.

What’s new in Contacts? Version 1.39 is in the App Store and it has:

* Sync – This is our most requested feature.  Once your contacts are de-duplicated, organized, accurate and complete, how can you get those Sunshine-improved contacts synced in iOS where you can use them as part of your daily routine across all the apps on your phone?  Sunshine Sync does just that.  For $39.99/year or $9.99/month, we will sync your contacts to iOS and Google — so they are right where you need them, when you need them.

* Better support for international phone numbers – Do you have international phone numbers in your contacts that don’t work?  Fear not – Sunshine Contacts will fix them for you.  Plus, we’ll flag which country it’s for and format the numbers properly.

* Better and more LinkedIns on contact cards – We work hard to identify the right LinkedIn for a person, so we can add their professional information to your card.  Recently, we’ve seen nice gains and improvements that have allowed us to enhance more cards with LinkedIns.

What does Sunshine Birthdays do?  Version 1.35 is in the App Store: bit.ly/sunshinebirthdays 
Sunshine Birthdays accesses calendar and contact entries as well as birthdays from Facebook, all with your permission of course, to get a complete list of birthdays.  Then, the app makes it easy to receive reminder notifications, weekly emails, and also offers some fun ways to celebrate with witty text messages, animated eCards, sending flowers or getting gift suggestions.

Have a great weekend!
Marissa Mayer & Enrique Muñoz Torres
Co-founders, Sunshine

Sunshine Contacts Update (3/17/23) Read More »

Sunshine Birthdays

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Sunshine Birthdays

Sunshine’s mission is to create advanced technologies that make mundane tasks effortless, free up your time, and make it easier to be thoughtful.

One of the key ways to let your friends and family know you are thinking of them is by remembering their birthday. Our new app, Sunshine Birthdays, makes sure that you never forget a birthday and it makes it easy to send a message or give a gift.

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/sunshine-birthdays/id1592003429

Sunshine Birthdays asks for access to your contacts, calendar, and Facebook. We find as many birthdays as we can and present them in a simple, easy-to-use chronological list.

You can turn notifications on and off by tapping the bell on the side of the person’s name. Sunshine will notify you 3 days before as well as on the birthday.

Tap the blue bell (left) to turn notifications on

Additionally, if you like a weekly preview of upcoming birthdays, you can set up a weekly reminder email with an overview of all birthdays in the next two weeks.

Finally, Sunshine Birthdays makes it easy to celebrate your friends special day. You can send a text, eCard, or flowers. You can try out our gift concierge to get ideas for a birthday present and, once you choose one, get help delivering it.

We hope you find Sunshine Birthdays useful. Try it out and send us your feedback at helios@sunshine.com!

Sunshine Birthdays Read More »

Say Hello to Sunshine Contacts

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Say Hello to Sunshine Contacts

We believe there has to be a way to use the power of today’s advanced technologies to free up some of your time, and we found that it starts in an unsuspecting place: your contact list.

Despite all the technological leaps and bounds helping us realize our wildest dreams, contact lists – the things that helps us manage the most important thing in our lives, our relationships – haven’t kept up.

What condition are your contacts in? If you are like most people, the contact cards on your phone are messy: they haven’t been updated in years, there are tons of duplicates, many are incomplete, some have out of date information, and, if you decided to clean them up, you wouldn’t even know where to start. (And, don’t worry, you’re not alone!)

In our personal and professional lives, we constantly meet new people. People move, change jobs, and get new emails and phone numbers all the time. Once contacts are added to your phone, they often don’t get touched again, despite almost continuous change. Managing updates is cumbersome and time-consuming, and usually requires mass emails or text chains. Often, we miss the changes altogether.

With Sunshine Contacts, you’ll always have the most accurate details at your fingertips – complete and in one organized place.

Great contacts are life changing.

Sunshine Contacts automatically creates a comprehensive set of your personal and professional contacts from disparate places like your phone, online address books, and email. Your previously, static messy contact cards are then magically organized and updated with the latest info.

Going a step further, Sunshine Contacts, with your permission, uses location data to better understand where you spend time and who you might want to share your contact info with. Plus, our system is constantly checking for new info as well as changes to your existing contacts to ensure you’re up-to-date.

Best of all, when you want to contact someone, Sunshine gives you the relevant context – like your most recent email exchange – so you have the right information at the right time for the friend, family member, or colleague you’re reaching out to.

Sunshine Contacts makes contacts just work.

Sunshine Contacts is currently offered by invitation. Here is what you can expect once you’ve received an invitation:

  • Organized contacts. Immediately see a more organized contact list, with correct spelling and duplicates removed.
  • Complete and comprehensive. Sunshine Contacts pulls information from a user’s iPhone, online address books, and email to create a thorough list with updated phone numbers, emails, addresses, and professional information. The app automatically updates outdated information.
  • Smart sharing. The app uses colocation and proximity detection data to better understand relationships and ease information sharing.
  • Thoughtful touches. When reaching out to a contact, Sunshine Contacts gives context for the relationship, highlighting the most recent correspondence.
Today, Sunshine Contacts is available to download through the App Store on iOS through invitation only. After installing the app to your device, you’ll be prompted to provide your information for the invitation program. When you receive your invite, you reenter the app and you will be prompted to complete your account information. After you’ve created your account, Sunshine Contacts does the rest: working its magic in the background, automating the mundane task of managing your contacts.

Before on iPhone Contacts

After on Sunshine

After on iPhone Contacts

At Sunshine, we are working on life’s practical, everyday problems. We’re starting by tackling your contact list, and over time we’ll solve event organization and group photo sharing too. It’s our mission to address these pain points for you so you can spend your time more meaningfully.

– Marissa and Enrique

Say Hello to Sunshine Contacts Read More »

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