Guide to Unique Holiday E-Greetings

Animation, custom verse, gags, and giving are among the wide selection of creative e-mail cards.

Joel Strauch, special to PC World

So you've impressed your friends and relatives with your technical prowess by sending them an e-card for every event, from the niece's first tooth to your uncle's beauty school graduation (don't get Aunt Bertha started). This holiday season, it's time to move to the next level and hit them all with unique e-greetings, from personalized sonnets to talking photos to presents that don't count and ones that really do.

Karaoke Cards

An animated Garfield stuffing his face with lasagna might be amusing for a few nanoseconds. But you can go a step further by personalizing an e-card with Real Allusion's CrazyTalk, software that lets you take any headshot and animate it with motion and audio. The software creates a digital wireframe of the main points of your photo's face. You record or type in a message or song, and the program integrates the spoken or sung message into the animated face.

It's a highly amusing and a bit freaky way to sing Grandma those carols without having to trek over the river and through the woods. The holiday version of CrazyTalk sells for $40 and includes a pack of three holiday cards. You can download the software--as well as a free trial version--from Real Allusion.

Virtual Enough to Taste

You know those cards that imply on the front that a ton of cash is inside? The ones that then create their own loophole that swipes back said cash? If you're a fan of such trickery, then you'll enjoy sending virtual presents.

You can choose from a variety of fake gifts, from Alaskan vacations to caulking guns to "live" animals such as a musk ox or a lionfish. Then you just type in your recipient's name and e-mail address and personalize it with a note explaining why you're too cheap to buy a real present. Just don't expect a thank-you card.

Perchance to E-Greet

While we have to note the affiliation--the site's owner is a contributing editor to PC World--we must acknowledge the uniqueness of the Sonnets4U site.

Lincoln Spector will craft a personalized 14-line ode to your loved one based on an e-mail description from you. And all for only $34.95. Sure, there are free e-cards out there, but do they feature iambic pentameter? Methinks not.

Giving Over Receiving

Perhaps the best e-greeting you can send is one that comes as the result of a charitable donation. At JustGive.org, you can send a donation to one of more than 850,000 charities. You can also search through a list of 1000 charities that meet a higher standard of criteria. For example, you can send a donation to the Autism Society of America in someone else's name and they will be sent an e-mail notifying them of your act.

You can also create your own wish list of charities that you would like your friends and families to donate to instead of sending you gifts.

Alternative Selection

For an assortment of more-standard digital greeting cards, as well as programs to create paper cards and organize the holiday list, check out PC World's Downloads section.

And lest you think we forgot you, dear reader, while compiling these resources for holiday greetings, here is a special card to stir up those feelings of holiday cheer. Its originator, E-Tractions, does not market e-greetings, but offers the virtual snow globe as a sample of its Internet marketing services (and sense of humor).