Split Stick USB Drive Keeps Work and Play Separate

Last month we told you about Quirky, a crowdsourced product design site that lets the community collaborate and deliberate about each step of the conception and manufacturing process. We’ll admit that we were a bit skeptical of the whole process, and Quirky’s first release, a universal cord retractor, didn’t exactly blow us away. But the Quirky crowd’s newest idea, the Split Stick USB drive, gives us hope that the crowd of amateur innovators has the potential for truly good ideas matched with a powerful new distribution model.

There are already a dizzying number of USB flash drives already available, from goofy novelty sticks to the purely functional, available in an equally dizzying variety of prices and capacities; and yet the Split Stick’s main draw is one we’ve never seen before. Aimed at those with both a mix of work and personal files and the desire to keep them both mentally and functionally separate, the Split Stick packs two discrete 2GB flash drives, each located at either end of the drive and fitted with their own USB connectors. With a touch of the built-in slider, users can switch between the drives without having to carry more than one. Quirky is currently waiting for 200 pre-orders before the $19.99 Split Stick is actually produced—you’ll only be charged if and when this quota is met—with revenue from the product being distributed back to the community that devised it.

[via Engadget]