Let’s get the family telling more stories, before they’re gone.
Hello and thank you for visiting. I originally built this for my own family stories and quickly realised that others may want to do the same. Here you can get a feel for the app and decide whether it is the right fit for your family before you commit.
When was the last time your family pulled out the family album in the front room - with someone pointing to a face, saying who that was and what happened next, while the youngsters in the room listened and learnt the stories for the next generation. Distance and busy lives have taken those afternoons away, and the album ends up scattered across everyone’s phones. It is hoped that this app recreates (albeit digitally) a room where a family can share their stories, together, whenever the mood strikes.
I have also found that it is a great way for the less talkative relatives to share really interesting stories!
Add a photograph, record a memory, walk a family tree. In the real app you can also start a video session, and if writing to a blank page is the hard part, turn on a gentle weekly email with one question to answer. Nothing you enter here is saved or uploaded, and when you close this page it is gone. This is just so you can see, in a minute or two, whether you feel it’s the right fit for your family.
Nothing you enter on this page leaves your device
Choose one you love. I will show it back to you the way a relative would see it. When you close this browser tab your photo is deleted.
Press record and just talk, the way you would at the kitchen table. Then listen back. There is nothing to write and nothing to get right.
If you like, check your microphone first - the same quick test the app offers before a real recording, so you are never left talking to a mic that isn’t listening.
The part people fall for
When a recording plays, the words follow along beneath it. In your own archive this is your relative’s real voice, written up for you. Here, press play and watch the words move. Tap any line to jump straight there, just like the real player.
In the app you can correct ‘and’ for ‘on’ on the last line. The technology is great, but not perfect.
This is where a list of names turns into people. Four generations, and every one of them a window into a story and a voice. Here is how the tree looks, it grows with each person added.
In your archive, every name here opens their page - the stories they are in, and a recording of their voice. This family is an example; yours will be your own.
A little way past this: cast the timeline to the television for Sunday afternoons together, and when you want something to hold, download a print-ready book laid out for you - print it at home or take it to whichever photo-book service you like.
I would be honoured if you chose to keep your family’s stories here - in their own voices, on a shared timeline, for the generations who are not here yet. Nothing you just did was saved, so when you are ready, sign up to start recording your family’s stories.
And it stays yours. Your archive is private to the people only you invite. The only access I hold is the administrative kind that any service needs to maintain performance and integrity: keeping the database healthy, running the backups, putting a fault right.
No passwords. I email you a link, you tap it, you are in.