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I guess this was one of those "inventions" which are pretty obvious in hindsight, and I bet more than one party had already though of building a USB drive, it w
by rob74 4y ago
I guess this was one of those "inventions" which are pretty obvious in hindsight, and I bet more than one party had already though of building a USB drive, it was just a question of the USB interface becoming widespread enough and of flash memory becoming affordable and reliable enough. Actually, flash memory cards with proprietary interfaces were available for some time before the year 2000 given in the article (Compact Flash since 1994, Sony's Memory Stick since 1998), so it was just the question of using USB instead of these interfaces.
- Cthulhu_ 4y agoThat reminds me, I don't remember if it was USB 1 or 2, but at some point I added a card to my PC that added two USB ports. I think that must've been USB 2.0 because the sockets were blue and I'm fairly sure I could hook up my keyboard and mouse through USB already.
- roperj 4y agoBlue is officially USB 3.0 - or possibly some knock off junk of course is always a possibility.
- russdill 4y agoYes, I think the use of the term "invented" as well as the idea that the invention was unfairly copied are a bit disingenuous. Credit where credit is due. Pulling together the different technologies and making them into a manufactural product is a great accomplishment. If there were inventions involved it would be the USB protocol, there mass storage specification, and of course flash memory. The thumb drive just brought those things together.