Flasher on the loose

Cory's a big fan of the flash drive (or if you prefer, "memory stick"). As a bit of a techno-geek, he has one that he stores some of his work stuff on-- and for a while was in the habit of wearing it on a lanyard around his neck. I liked to call it his "nerd necklace," which seemed to discourage him from wearing it more often.

Now don't get me wrong-- I have a flash drive of my own. I bought it once our station started using computer-based editing programs. I can download (upload?) my video from the computer into the flash drive so that I can watch it on my computer at home. In fact, just tonight, I
put my way-cool story about the Stanley Cup onto my flash drive. So, I have the technology. I just don't like to advertise my geekiness by wearing it as a fashion accessory.

About four years ago, when "flash drives" first came out, Cory convinced me that it would be a good idea to get my dad one for Christmas. It ended up being a pretty good gift-- while he was
visiting us, he could do work on his laptop, then if he wanted to email it, could save it onto his memory stick, and load it into my PC which had internet access.

Since then, I've stumbled across flash drives as PR devices-- when I was at Super Bowl XLI this year, the Super Bowl XLII committee was plugging their venue by handing out flash drives, which were loaded with information and pictures of Glendale Arizona and the University of Phoenix Stadium... site of next year's game. And when one of my co-workers swiped it, I was ticked off!

Now there's a company called Pexagon, that's designing Personalized Flash Drives specifically for gift-giving.... with available themes like snowflakes and butterflies that you can have engraved on the flash drives. You can even have them personalized. And of course, you can always pre-load them with fun stuff like pictures for grandma (assuming she's fairly computer savvy) or loaded with MP3 files of music for your kids (assuming that you can figure out what kind of music they'll like). Of course, you could also give them a blank one-- nothing's wrong with that, either.

Just warn them... if you ever see them wearing it lanyard, you hold the right to mock them incessantly and call it a "nerd necklace."