Send Real Greeting Cards With Apple's New Cards App

[MacRumors]

Apple's newest app, Cards, was announced last week during the iPhone 4S keynote, and finally went live today.

Cards is an iOS version of the greeting card-maker built-in to iPhoto, but with a twist -- instead of printing and shipping cards to the user, who then has to buy stamps, address and mail the cards -- Apple takes care of printing, mailing, and postage and sends the card directly to the recipient, with a push notification going to the senders iPhone upon delivery.

The new Cards app from Apple lets you create and mail beautifully crafted cards personalized with your own text and photos -- right from your iPhone or iPod touch. Take a quick snapshot and with a few taps and swipes, an elegant letterpress card is on its way to any address in the world. Each card is just $2.99 when sent within the U.S. and $4.99 when sent to or from anywhere else. And that includes postage.

The Cards app is free on the App Store for iPhone. [App Store]

Article Link: Send Real Greeting Cards With Apple's New Cards App

[Twizz91]

it's yay day!

[Wilson1313]

And another sweet launch by Apple!! There servers will be toast after today

[Defender2010]

It is not a universal app...

[Laird Knox]

Originally Posted by Defender2010

It is not a universal app...

Not only that but it flat out won't install on the iPad.

EDIT: Seems to be an iOS issue not a device issue. Error message was misleading.

[BMcCoy]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3_5 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8L1 Safari/6533.18.5)

Is it in the UK?

[coolaaron88]

From the Apple Website

"Cards requires iOS 5 on iPhone 3GS or later, iPod touch (3rd and 4th generation), iPad, or iPad 2."

[kirky29]

Certainly going to be an app I use a fair bit.
Just making the first card for my G'dads Birthday next week

[zin]

Originally Posted by BMcCoy

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3_5 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8L1 Safari/6533.18.5)

Is it in the UK?

Certainly is. £3.99 to send a card anywhere in the world, too. More expensive than US Domestic, but in-line with US world-wide prices, though.
_______

I have relatives in Australia; £3.99 seems quite a nice all-in-one cost for the card and delivery.

[justinfreid]

So Apple's released 4 new iOS apps today alongside iOS 5.
I bet a lot of iCards will be sent to 1 Infinite Loop as condolences for Steve Jobs' passing.
---
I just tried to install the app and realized it requires iOS 5.
I suppose it's possible that this uses an API that's only supported by the new OS, but otherwise there's a PLIST string that ought to be changed.

[scottishwildcat]

Touchnote app has been doing this for a while on iOS and Android, and their postcards are cheaper to send. Just sayin'...

[LordJohnWhorfin]

There are already at least two companies who offer the same service for much less: Touchnote ($1.49 anywhere in the world) and Postagram ($0.99)
The apps are of course free (iPhone and Android).

[NameUndecided]

Take that, store-bought, empty-gesture, lamely-written, $6 greeting cards!

[nsayer]

Meh. All it does is hang and then finally crash when I try to send a card.

Not impressed.

EDIT: After 5 tries, it finally started down the purchasing route, but fails now because I use paypal as my payment method, and it's asking me for a CVV, which is entirely not applicable.

[QuarterSwede]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9A334 Safari/7534.48.3)

Three thoughts:

A. Greeting Card companies that charge an outrageous fee for their cards (Hallmark, American Greetings, etc.) are going to lose some business.

2. To respond they will come up with their own apps.

D. In typical Apple style this app is beautifully designed and animation heavy (iOS 5 only API's?). There are far more cards than I thought would be available and they all look fantastic. It's very easy to add pictures and edit text and move from inside, outside and envelope views. Also, the cards are letter pressed so it isn't just printed card stock. Very slick.

[lazyrighteye]

Originally Posted by Wilson1313

And another sweet launch by Apple!! There servers will be toast after today

And just wait until this eve when most working Americans get home to update their Macs, iDevices and Apple TVs. Ohman...

I can't recall Apple releasing more in one day than today.
Fun day for the consumer.

[haydn!]

This is a fantastic little App from Apple!

The card templates included are stunning, but all so serious! It is just crying out for the moon-pig treatment! Adding card styles that resemble movie posters, magazine and newspaper covers etc.

[mattpreston11]

£3.99 from the UK, poor.I wouldn't ever spend that on a card.

Although tbf, I usually get iTunes credit on the cheap. So maybe?

[bigrash]

Originally Posted by LordJohnWhorfin

There are already at least two companies who offer the same service for much less: Touchnote ($1.49 anywhere in the world) and Postagram ($0.99)
The apps are of course free (iPhone and Android).

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think touchnote and postagram only sends postcards. Apple Cards app sends an actual folded card in an envelope.

[dgalvan123]

Ha! This morning my wife grabbed her iphone as soon as she woke up to see if this Cards app was live yet. Out of all the things that were getting released today, I had actually forgotten about this one, but it's the only one she cared about.

Pretty decent deal, considering a greeting card bought at a store can cost anywhere from $1 - $6, plus postage. The convenience alone is a selling point.

Down side is that you might not have the right photos on your iphone/ipad, though, which would require an inconvenient synch.

[jamesarm97]

Originally Posted by Defender2010

It is not a universal app...

Exactly, why the heck did Apple release an iPhone only designed app? The first thing I did was pull out my iPad after trying it on the iPhone to see how nice an beautiful it would look only to be greeted with the small iPhone sized screen. It still looks ok in the 2x mode, just wondering about the lack of universal support directly from Apple.

[garylapointe]

The app was dated the 9th, I saw it earlier and I was wondering how I missed it. They must have uploaded it but not turned it on until today...

Gary

[Caliber26]

This looks pretty cool. Although, I can't really think of many people who I would mail a card to. All my family lives within miles of me and most my friends out of town are the kind of people I can easily appease with a "Happy Birthday" comment on Facebook.

Maybe one of my alter personalities will surprise me with one in the mail, one of these days.

[G4DP]

Originally Posted by NameUndecided

Take that, store-bought, empty-gesture, lamely-written, $6 greeting cards!

So they receive a cheap, lame, empty gesture no effort picture.

At least with a card, you have bothered to get off your lazy ass and send something. Which means you have had to give it some thought.

Apple, single handedly making the world lazier.

[bikertwin]

Originally Posted by G4DP

So they receive a cheap, lame, empty gesture no effort picture.

At least with a card, you have bothered to get off your lazy ass and send something. Which means you have had to give it some thought.

Apple, single handedly making the world lazier.

Not only that, but there's also nothing handwritten in it. No human touch.

Might as well send an electronic card and save the printing & postage. Or make and print a card at home, hand-write something on it, and mail it.