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Families have collectively jumped on the Web with gusto. Online tools have given them the ability to do everything from track the family schedule to keep in touch with distant relatives, monitor their children's browsing, and more. Many of these services are even becoming available on mobile platforms, which is critical for those parents on the go. Here's a rundown of some of the sites available for you and your family.
Tell us in the comments about which services you and your family use.
Family-Friendly Browsing
Glubble - Provides much more than a safe browsing environment for the kiddies. They also offer a Twitter-like platform for family members to keep in touch, photo sharing, schedules, etc. To learn more about Glubble, read Mashable's previous coverage here.
Kidzui - Offers a safe browser for kids, along with a slew of games, videos and websites that are kid-friendly.
KidRocket - Another safe browsing platform for your kids.
Pikluk - Not only provides safe browsing but also safe email.
BuddyBrowser - A safe browser for kids with an appealing look for the younger child.
Totlol - Almost like a safe YouTube for children.
Content Sharing
ZOOOF - Family members can share their biographies, childhood memories, photos and much more here.
Story of My Life - Focuses on capturing your memories and family history
Stixy - Share documents, photos, to do lists and more with family and friends.
Wamily - For teams, families, clubs and everything in-between. Share photos, run a wiki, etc.
Shwup - Allows family members to create and share multimedia photo albums with music and videos.
LifeSnapz - Lets you document your family's history on a timeline and share it with everyone.
Famster - Allows you to upload and share photos and videos and have safe Web-based online instant messaging with family members
Respectance - Allows you to pay tribute to dearly departed members of the family.
Schedule Management
Commily - Lets you keep in touch and arrange activities with families in your local community.
Famundo - Appears to offer the most features with their free ad-supported version, as well as their premium $9.99/month version. They offer their premium version for free to organizations such as schools, churches, etc.
Famiva - Offers some unique features the others do not, such as a map tool that shows where everyone is located, a family network diagram that shows how everyone links together, and blogs where you can embed video and images.
FamilyCrossings - Has one of the best looking sites and easiest interfaces (here is a Virtual Tour). They offer 6 core features with the free account and 15 features for the $10/month premium account. Free features include: News, Photos, Calendar, Address Book, Live Chat and Gift Center.
Cozi - Has a meager set of features such as a calendar, shopping list maker and the ability to send text messages to family members. Though this might be enough for some families.
SchoolPulse - Manages your family schedule along with your children's school calendar of events. Here's our previous coverage.
TripCart - lets family members have fun planning their next family trip with lots of visual tools and maps.
Note: In "Top 10 Tools for Soccer Moms and Weekend Warriors", we covered schedule management for families with children active in sports.
Parenting & Newborns
baveo.com - Basically a blogging platform ala WordPress for expecting parents. It's a great way to document the entire experience and provides a number of options for keeping family and friends updated.
BabySpot - Captures your baby's precious moments to share with anyone you want.
Lil'Grams - Lets parents capture milestone moments as they occur for the first time.
Kidmondo - Offers an online diary and growth charts to track your baby's progress and much more.
AboutMyBaby - Offers an online scrapbooking platform for new moms that they can share with others.
TotSpot - Parents can blog about their baby and share it with family members.
SavvyAuntie - You don't have to be a parent, you can be a savvy aunt. This site offers great resources, as well as a community for aunts.
Family Trees
www.ancestry.com - A well-known genealogy site. Great place to research family tree information. Some searches and information are free, but most aren't.
MyFamily - Lets you add audio narration to photo slideshows. From the same folks behind ancestry.com, which gives it a strong advantage over the others when it comes to genealogy and family tree building, because it can exchange information with the massive ancestry database.
KinCafe - Has a much more pleasing interface than Famundo, but nowhere near the amount of features. Still, many will prefer the less is more offering here.
Geni - Has a powerful and elegant family tree maker online. It includes photos of family members and contact information. Though it needs the ability to connect, search and download from an ancestry database of some kind.
GeneTree - Provides family tree building with a twist. They introduce the concept of connecting to relatives through DNA on a global level.
MyHeritage - A popular family tree creation service.
Genoom - Families can create their family tree together and share memories, photos and stories, too.
Amiglia - Offers a little of everything; Photo albums, Stories, and something they call the Family Facebook.
Conclusion
Social networking has come to families in a big way, enabling relatives to take full advantage of these tools to stay in touch. While some attempt to provide families with everything they need, others are trying to carve their own little niche by providing a single service. Ultimately, every family will need to try different services to see which one will best suit their needs.
Imagery provided by iStockPhoto/pkline
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