DataStickies: USB drives as sticky notes
datastickies.com
datastickies.com
Apparently adverts for products which don't exist and never will exist are also nearly indistinguishable from adverts for advanced technology.
It's a designer's reboot of the "portable disk" interaction paradigm we have that started with cassettes and moved to floppies and disks and now portable hard drives/flash drives.
> dataSTICKIES: A design concept conceptualised as graphene-based flash drives that replace USB data drives.
i see this as an appealing visualisation of "if technology gave us storage materials of this form, how might we design a product based around it?", in much the same way that science fiction extrapolates tech advances and tries to imagine devices using them.
This idea is by no means the worst- that award goes to the 'modular' mobile phone designed to reduce waste, that anyone with the slightest bit of knowledge of mass production or high-speed circuitry would instantly write off as laughable. With flexible circuitry, this is actually not that far from being possible. The main issue is the data transfer.. you could spend a lot of time and money getting something to work poorly, or you could just obtain the same practical functionality infinitely better and easier by making them act as physical shortcuts to cloud (or local) storage-- why would you want your data strewn across many slow, small stickies that you could easily lose instead!? And this links back to my original point that the engineers have already thought of it-- because you have just reinvented NFC.
- The author's creativity and intelligence in extrapolating the technology's wider implications
- A good story, including character development
- Often some incredibly clever prose
- Possibly, as a very secondary thing, elements of "Hey, imagine if AI was complex enough to form human relationships!" (for example)
Here, I'm being offered the content of "Hey imagine if USB sticks were really cheap and you could just stick them on your computer like a post it!", but with the tone of "I created this thing: look how clever it is, here I am receiving an award for my ingenuity.
On the other hand, I love concept videos.
I suppose that's inevitable in the long run.
If this were on DeviantArt, etc., clearly framed as a design, the reactions would be more muted and possibly positive.
I think there is something to using physical locations to keep references to files. I can remember the shelf that I stored a notebook and the rough location in the notebook of a sketch for a project from 2005. I can't say the same about my filesystems even with the help of "cloud" services of more recent years.
Our brains are definitely wired to get clues from lots of context, and just sitting at a similarly layed out UI doesn't take advantage of that.
So drop the crazy magic... add rfid tags to the stickys ... replace the optical(??) strip thing with an rfid reader that just maps the stickies to my cloud files, and that might be relatively useful.... pretty sure rfids aren't quite disposable yet though.
It's on github [1]. Though I haven't created any video or documentation yet.
You have a point.
There has been research on making "File Explorer"-like applications have similar "enriched" context as what you're referring to, but it never took off.
(various interesting ways to approach this idea, but they are irrelevant to the point I want to make here)
I think one reason (though probably not the/foremost reason) might be that, unlike an actual physical storage context, there is no guarantee that whenever you view a particular folder, it will be displayed in this particular manner.
Some applications have their own file-explore/open dialog, sometimes apps or websites will transform your view. Currently, most OS's have at least three different ways to "view" the same folder (list/icons/details).
If your data is on a USB-stick, it's even worse, every device will show you its particular "interpretation" of your filesystem structure. This was less of a problem with the smaller 512MB sticks that might contain just a few files, but nowadays 32GB sticks are not uncommon, holding a user's entire documents library (or a copy thereof).
Contrast with a physical file system, nobody is going to impose their "view" or "interpretation" of your personal (physical) files. In fact, it's considered bad manners to reorder someone's bookshelves without permission ;)
That's (part of) the reason why you can find files so easily in physical systems, because every time you interact with it, your memory of where particular items are located is reinforced, because there is just one representation of that system, regardless of context. This representation might even be sub-optimal qua efficiency, and you can still at least reap the benefit of familiarity.
And can do the same thing, associate data. Generate unique urls that go to a web service that allows "mapping".
I see where you are coming from now and I think this would be true if search was absent from digital note takers. Now, though all you have to remember is where/which project you usually use to store notes and then search.
That is why, in my opinion, physical locations are less relevant when talking about digital content.
Note, i don't actually care for the answers at this point, just wanted to lay out for the guys who made the page how its very confusing and useful for getting me to want it.
Edit: So as it turns out that this is in fact a fake advertisement for a non-extant product i feel compelled to point out this irony: I assume some ad company or group made this in order to attract customers, likely because they have a hard time getting real customers. Now the ironic part is that my confusion when faced with it demonstrates perfectly why they have such difficulties.
This should be made MUCH MUCH clearer, because it's a really cool idea that takes way too long to find in that page.
Of course, you could store just some cryptographic keys and unique file IDs on a small, low-throughput drive in a form factor like this, and link it into a cloud storage service. That would at least approach making practical sense.
The thing is, if you're going to require an internet connection to make the little tabs work at all, you may as well just do it all online in a pure cloud service in the first place…
But yeah, it is confusing that the site doesn’t make that clear. They should show how you plug dataSTICKIES in right next to that “not the USB port” image in the Why block.
I think it's super important to have creatives like designers and science fiction writers conjure a wonderful future as it is exciting and inspiring. Not all of it will make sense (flying cars anybody?), but it capture the imagination.
Full disclosure - I'm not a creative (I wish I was more creative), but just think it's important to have perspective
If they were cheap enough they would be nearly disposable. I can also see them having the same problem as disposable information storage.
Like their namesake, sticky-notes, they might be great for quickly storing an idea but terrible for retrieving them because they end up getting misplaced or lost among a big pile of paper.
The majority of the negativity seems to stem from it not being an existing product, which is a silly thing to be indignant about, especially considering the first two words on the page clearly state "design concept". Even if the optical transfer strip isn't feasible, there are certainly other options to transfer data in a similar fashion. To see such a large group of knowledgeable people completely disregard an idea for no legitimate reason is.. baffling, to say the least.
On one hand they talk about optical things, and then on the other hand they're talking about 'conductive'. Seriously? Regardless, you do not bypass the laws of physics. You need atleast a complete circuit for it to be powered. And if their cop-out is that it's got a super-micro-pico-tiny-high-density-capacitor then I'm not even going to bother poking holes anymore.
Well, there is a way but it's pointlessly slow - inductive power.
The whole concept is quite flawed in my opinion [EDIT - unless their plan is to showcase a theoretical ultrathin USB flash drive.]
. . . . .
. . . .
. . . . .
Graphene organs, stick them to your face and let them compensate for your bad health via sound.
I actively leverage my dislike of visual clutter on my desk by putting things I don't want to do, but have to, on a post-it on the edge of my monitor. That photo of a bunch of these things cluttering up a monitor is just one big NOPE.
Personally I feel like the form factor of the USB drive is getting close to the bare minimum size as a physical token to put files on. They're small enough to embed in a wide array of whimsically-shaped objects.
Hell, take this magical "optical data transfer surface" and cover your desk in it; build these in small modules that an end user can put into ANYTHING. Put one in the bottom of that action figure you have on the desk, that cool traditional craft piece an ex sent back from their trip to Foreign Parts, whatever - if you want to replace USB drives, I feel like there's a much wider array of things sitting on your desk to put data into than post-its.
(we all wait in fear of how powerful, potent or dense each new material technology can be)
(we all fear that our world is not easy or colorful enough)
(we all fear that we missed out on something profound and sweeping)
(we all fear that we're being lied to)
(we all fear that others will lie to the ones we love ( and that we'll have to fix their windows 8 at christmas ) )
Not a bad concept. I just fear that the adhesive might not last very long. Unless, if it uses another form of adhesion, such as magnets.
It's both optical, and conducts data via some plastic adhesive. You can't say they haven't thought things through.
(1) Print 100 qr code stickers that go to unique urls on a web service (2) web service serves "upload form" on first render (or enter url form, whatever the user wants to "save"). (3) web service redirects to file download (or url) on all subsequent visits, no longer allowing upload.
Sticky data you can put inside a book and retrieve later by scanning (or typing in the url, which was also printed on the sticker cause no one will actually use QR codes).
Too many files to be cloud managed
Business secrets you don't want on the cloud
Files too big to quickly transfer Have a stack of "stickies" stuck to your monitor.
Drag files to the "drive" or "stack of stickies".
Files automatically go to the top "sticky" on the stack.
Peel off top sticky and use.
Drive IT at your office insane with all the frivolous unchecked data transfer. ;)They complain that usb ports are hard to get and instead we should add a sticky surface the transfers data to the bottom of our monitors? Why not just buy a monitor with a few usb ports on it if you really want that? It already exists and is far more useful as it can be used with the wide range of usb products that already exist (phone charger, mouse etc). I can see no advantages that this has over buying a usb stick (unless I'm missing something big?).
Here's my equally pointless take on modern data transfer. We all have phone that store our data. They connect via bluetooth when near to a computer (Much like wifi the first time it pairs with a computer you must enter a pin). It then acts like a usb data storage. And huzzah, never again will you have to reach down and plug something into a usb port! Huzzah, never again will you have all those issues with usb ports wearing out or your usb stick getting knocked out while you were in the middle of a presentation! Never again will you struggle with not knowing which way around a usb stick should go! (This is actually kind of useful I guess?). If they don't have bluetooth then you can just connect your phone with a usb wire (as you will be doing 99% of the time). I'm not sure if it's clear here but my point is that they seem to be solving a problem (and using magic to do so) but no one actually has that problem.
Add an e-ink display and show the contents of the "readme.md" located on the stick.
also it would be great if they are chewable.. looks like pack of juicy fruit gum
Well designed, but, don't they know USB sticks are on their way out?
This is a waste of time.