When we started building A Story Before Bed in late 2008 there was really only one place to have customers record videos of themselves reading children’s books – inside a web browser on a PC or Mac with an attached webcam. So that’s the path we pursued. But a year and a half later when the iPad was announced, we realized immediately that there was no better device on which to record (and watch) yourself reading a bedtime story than on a bedtime computer. And while A Story Before Bed is definitely a positive experience on a PC/Mac with a webcam, the cuddle factor is decidedly low.

While the first iPad didn’t have a camera (front-facing or otherwise) we knew that it was only a matter of time before it did. We worked hard over the past year to slowly bring the functionality from the web app to our iOS app until last Sunday night we submitted version 2.0 of our app to Apple. And now, if you have an iPad2, you can:

• record any of 350+ books right into your iPad2’s front-facing camera and mic (just the 3 freebie books if you’re not a Mega subscriber)
• have those recordings sync back to our website so anyone with a PC or Mac or with any of the Apple mobile devices (iPad1, iPhone, iPod Touch, etc.) can watch the recording
• and of course sync recordings made on a PC or Mac down to the iPad as well

Record from anywhere. Watch from anywhere. Everything synchronizes beautifully. It just feels… lovely.

I mistakenly thought that when we launched our service in November of 2009 that it was ready to show people just how magical this scenario can be. We had a lovely launch and did a good job getting there. But, the service we have now is so much more mature, deep, and ready to really make families happy with the over 350 books (and growing) in our catalog. The journey is definitely taken one small step at a time, but it’s nice when there are milestone moments where you can pause for a brief second and enjoy just how many customers you can now make happy.

OK. Moment over. On to the next round of improvements and investments. :)