When worlds collide

I like to geek out on multiple levels. The SkateDrive allows me to (over)spend money on two of my favorite areas of interest at once, computers and skateboarding. These are USB memory drives that come in the shape of skateboards with Santa Cruz logos. So you can put a bunch of skate rock MP3s on the drive and use it as a fingerboard when it’s not plugged in. Of course, you’ll pay a premium price for dual use “functionality.” In fact, it will cost you more than if you were to buy a 2GB memory stick and a fingerboard packaged separately, which hardly seems right. They must have done their market research on this one. I am a skateboarder who is smart enough to know how to use a computer, but dumb enough to pay an absurd amount of money for a skateboard shaped flash drive. – Thanks to Dr Brad for the tip.

SkateDrive USB memory stick shaped like Santa Cruz Skateboards

Check out that body construction. Looks like the old Santa Cruz foam core construction has been brought back from the dead!

There are three models of skateboards, and the web site is set up in such a way that it hints at the possibility of other companies. Of course, you can also get surfboard and snowboard versions. They are labeled as checkered, screaming hand and signature models. I guess they didn’t want to have to pay Steve Olson any royalties. Speaking of royalties, I wonder if Jim Phillips has settled his grievance with Santa Cruz?

$22.99 is what I pad for this. Yes, I’m embarrassed. The same 2GB in a drive that doesn’t look like a skateboard will cost you about $17 or less if you buy it in multiples. Another $4 would get you a fingerboard with trucks that weren’t fixed. You’d come out at least $2 ahead, but you wouldn’t get the nifty lanyard or the bundled content from Santa Cruz. More on that later.

Gratuitous product shots:

Caputred in the wild.

SkateDrive bundled content from Santa Cruz.

Of course it’s meant to run on windows, but buried in there is a web interface for the goodies. Some of those just link to folders on the drive. There are four videos (three really, since one is just an ID for Strange Notes) that are compressed in at a slightly higher quality level than YouTube. The product catalog that is supposed to be included is actually just a web link to the NHS web site.

There are a bunch of photos in various formats and sizes, from jpegs to pdfs to a large Tiff, so it seems like they didn’t put much effort into this, even though some of the potos are quite good. Others are not.
Top sequence is Flo Marfaing. The bottom is Emmanual Guzman on the nose blunt.

Last but not least, here’s another example. A nice shot of Eric Dressen photographed at Burnside.