For the estimated 10,000 mothers serving in Iraq, Mother’s Day won’t include breakfast in bed or a warm family gathering this year. But technology and goodwill are stepping in to help fill that void and get Moms and their remote families closer to each other on this special occasion. Qipit (www.qipit.com), a free service that turns your digital camera or mobile phone into a personal scanner, has teamed with the non-profit group eMOM to provide a way for families at home to send wishes to the moms serving in Iraq or Afghanistan, or help those military who are deployed get loving messages back to moms stateside.

When the Department of Defense cancelled the Any Service Member mail after 9/11, a grassroots group, eMail Our Military (eMOM), was created to help fill the void. “Here at eMail Our Military, we were already getting our messages of love and support to the front lines electronically. Now with Qipit we can again send the actual drawings and displays of love and affection from their creators to our troops,” said Trish Forant, founder eMOM. eMOM is based in Miami Lakes, Florida.

By using a digital camera or camera phone and the free Qipit service, a high quality PDF of artwork, photographs, personal messages or any written document can be converted to a readable form and sent quickly.

How to Send a Mother's Day Card using Qipit

1. Register for a free Qipit account at www.qipit.com, if you don't already have one.

2. Create your card or special message on paper or a whiteboard. You can also use a pre-made Mother's Day card and add your special message.

3. Take a picture of your Mother's Day creation with a megapixel (or more) camera phone or a digital camera.

4. Turn the picture into a Qipit Mother's Day card by sending the picture to color@qipit.com via email, as an attachment, or via your camera phone as an MMS.

Tip: Enter your Mom's email address in the subject line of the MMS if you want to send it directly from your camera phone. She will receive your Mother’s Day card as a PDF file attached to an email sent by the Qipit service on your behalf (your name will appear as the sender). Otherwise you can send it as an email or link from the web interface.

“Qipit can help make the pain of separation just a little bit easier on military service members and their families,” said Benoit Bergeret, CEO of Qipit. “Home-made cards are always the best and Qipit saves a trip to a copy store.”

"I will be heading back to the front soon and know firsthand the hardship we military families go through when we are separated," said Lt. Colonel Dan Mosqueda, Air Force Reserves. "Qipit is a great way for my family and those under my command to get and send the really personal messages that all military families crave so much when we're apart.”

After you send the image to the appropriate Qipit email address, Qipit’s patented ink-extraction technology then automatically transforms it into a high contrast, easy-to-read digital copy or “qipit” that can then be stored or shared online, safe from physical harm.

Unlike the original photograph of a document, which appears as a dark, low contrast picture, scan-quality “qipits” are clear ink-on-white digital copies of the original documents. And, thanks to Qipit’s best-in-class scanning technology, the quality and integrity of the photographs in the documents are maintained, even as the text quality and readability is improved. A qipit digital copy can be easily read, printed, and faxed. In addition, qipit copies can be made public and shared via a URL link to the original online document for easy access and sharing in an emergency.

• Pivot3/Mirasys Bring Serverless Computing to European Surveillance Market