1. What exactly is the Servio Personal Server? What does it offer home users that they don't have today?

The Servio is our answer to the question, "What's next after broadband?" Today's households are importing and generating record amounts of digital content, such as digital video, pictures and music, yet the PC is an inadequate solution for the management of that content.

The Servio is a Personal Server, offering households a single repository for all their digital information, enabling them to store, organize, access and share their pictures, video and music with anyone, through any browser in the home or on the Internet at large.

The combination of a mail server, database server, Web server, firewall and the Memora Applications Suite, all stored locally in a single device, enables the Servio to give users a new level of control over, and enjoyment of, their content.

In addition, where the PC's limited file system has trapped digital content within the confines of the home, the Servio enables users to share their content with anyone, anywhere on the Internet.

2. What is the difference between a Personal Server and a residential gateway?

The Personal Server takes all the functionality of a residential gateway - the ability to share a single broadband connection through a LAN - and adds the power of a robust digital content management system, extending the benefits of the LAN to the Internet at large.

Rather than focusing purely on the network within the house, the Personal Server makes the Internet your network, enabling you to grant others access to your information when you want, and most importantly, to get at your information when you want, from wherever you want.

3. Are consumers the only beneficiaries of this new product?

No. The Personal Server represents a tremendous opportunity for PC manufacturers and service providers to offer new benefits to their customers. We have taken the concept of distributed computing, and taken it a step closer to the consumer, giving them the power of a dedicated server in their homes, yet administered and upgradeable remotely.

4. How do you see the Personal Server affecting the way consumers use the Internet?

The Personal Server essentially takes our current use of the Internet and turns it inside out. Where we were previously limited to mostly search and retrieval of information, the Personal Server enables us to make the Internet our network, publishing our content out to friends and family from our locally-hosted server.

In short, the Personal Server gives home users their own piece of the Internet.

5. How does the homeowner interface with the Personal Server?

Because the Personal Server manages so many different types of data, Memora has focused on offering the end user a simple and intuitive means of getting to their information: through the browser.

There are no new downloads, and no new complex user interfaces to learn. Through our applications, the user's information is never more than three clicks away. It is the Servio's job to take high-volume, complex stores of information, and present them in a logical, easily accessible manner.

6. How much data can be stored on the Personal Server and how is it backed up?

We are currently offering two different versions of the Servio Personal Server; one with 30 gigabytes of storage and the second with 60 gigabytes. At 60 gigabytes of storage, this translates into roughly 120,000 digital pictures, 12,000 digital video clips, or 15,000 MP3s.

In addition, Memora offers a complete remote backup service, ensuring that all of our customers' information is secure. Because the Servio is constantly in contact with the Memora Service, we are also able to monitor its proper functioning, and manage any problems should they arise.

7. What kinds of future applications do you plan to build for the Personal Server platform?

The Servio Personal Server was built with the understanding that we're only in the beginning of the digital explosion. As new media formats emerge, and fatter pipes open up to broadband homes, the Servio will continue to evolve.

We believe that the Personal Server will be the digital hub of the household, offering the ability to serve up music wirelessly to the user in their car or on the train, or to integrate with home control systems to turn the heat up when the user is returning home from a weekend away.

As more and more browser-based devices emerge, the Personal Server will be the central nervous system of the household, monitoring and managing all of the home's information and ensuring that it is accessible from any browser, both inside and home and on the Internet.

8. Where do you see the Personal Server in three years?

We see the Personal Server as the central nervous system of digital houses. Users will be able to establish a series of rules that govern how their content is stored, organized and accessed, from movies to the family calendar.

The Personal Server will interface with all of our digital devices, from WAP-enabled phones, to Web Tabs in the kitchen.

We'll be able to dial in to the Servio from the car and tell it to Memorize the front page of the Wall Street Journal, or to capture the West Wing, and make them accessible to us through a browser when we reach our hotel on a road trip.

We're early on in the development of the Personal Server, but we are convinced that it will create a whole new level of enjoyment of our digital lives.

Antonio Rodriguez Founder, CEO

As CEO, Antonio is responsible for system design and overseeing day-to-operations of the company. Before founding Memora, Antonio worked as a product manager at Cambridge based Abuzz, prior to the company's sale to The New York Times Company. Before that Antonio was with the Boston Consulting Group where he worked in retail consumer goods and high technology, including a number of large-scale IT projects.

Antonio also has a particular affinity for the Open-Source Community, the unsung heroes behind Memora's flagship product, the Servio. It was while studying at Stanford University that Antonio first met some of the interesting cast of characters that provide the base within which the Memora Applications are able to perform their magic (GPLed software). Though his contributions back to the community have thus far been adequate, it is his hope that Memora may some day contribute large parts of its application framework back to the Open Source community.

Antonio holds an MBA from Stanford University and a BA from Harvard University.