A message I sent to the Picasa team today…
Picasa is such an easy to use program, I install it on the computer of every friend and family member I have – it has allowed them to get more out of the digital pictures I send them. But, here’s the problem: there’s only ONE online print provider for all of us in Canada, and it’s an outfit out of the UK that, frankly, is completely terrible. I’ve been waiting and waiting for other Canadian printers to be added – Wal-Mart, Future Shop, London Drugs, ANYONE…but still nothing. It’s incredibly frustrating.
I think this may have been the biggest casualty from the Google acquisition: before when Picasa was a commercial product, I felt like the team was more open and interested in hearing from customers and making the product better. But now that it’s a free product, I sense much less inclination to make the product better for everyone: when I asked about getting more online photo printing options available in Canada, I was told that it was up to the photo printing companies to come to Google, not the other way around. That’s a shockingly bad attitude, and it comes from being part of Google – I think it’s very unfortunate.
Please, please: do more to make Picasa play nice with others even if you *are* the mighty Google. Get more print providers for Canada and other countries. Get some integration and functionality with providers like Smugmug…