Presto: E-mail Into Newsletters

I’ve seen several ideas over the years to try to figure out how to connect those of us that live and die by our electronic tether (e-mail, SMS, Facebook) to loved ones who don’t use a computer or in other countries where they don’t have computers (e.g., rural India several years ago).

Now there’s a new service called Presto (www.presto.com).  You set up a “printer” in their home which connects to an analog phone line.  You can then send them e-mails which get re-formated into a newsletter with the attachments printed.  You can tag photos in facebook for them to get printed.  You can schedule reminders for them that get triggered and printed at a fixed time. 

Sounds pretty cool to me.  In general, the older population (65-80) are pretty responsive to phone based solutions (like we do at Silverlink), but you do see a drop off after 80.  If this solution ever were to take off and the caregivers could opt-in their parents to accept reminders (e.g., adherence, medical appointment) from health plans, PBMs, ACOs, and other organizations, this would be an interesting new channel for reach.