HardwareAn origami USB connector and a games console that’ll fit in your wallet—two entries in a contest to make business cards excitingWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
HardwareAn origami USB connector and a games console that’ll fit in your wallet—two entries in a contest to make business cards excitingWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
(Image credit: LambertTheMaker)
Business cards are a dying art—in the West, anyways. Most of us may never come to appreciate a finely crafted card capable of making a slick-haired serial killer wince with jealousy. But thisbusiness card competition over at Hackadayhopes to change that. Or, at the very least, get creative with what constitutes a ‘card’.
There are some guidelines for business cards entering into the contest: the card has to be roughly 3.5 x 2-inches and should “fit easily in a pocket”. Beyond these few basic guidelines, the rules are open to interpretation. Though there are a few categories to strive for, including for the thinnest cards, utilitarian cards, and best-looking cards.
The contest runs until July 2 but we’ve already various excellent entrants to gawk at.
So, a games console, then? That’s my kinda card.
There’s one more like it, too. This card fromEdison Science Corneris a mini tic-tac-toe console.
Another is a couple sheets of paper—seriously—and between which creatorLincoln Ueharahas stuffed a circuit. With the correct cuts and folds, it’s possible to fold the pieces of paper into a usable USB Type-A connector. In theory, it’s then possible to use this to create some sort of usable flash drive, though as far as I can tell, the WIP project lights an LED.
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(Image credit: Lincoln Uehara)
This card fromMartynasis handy in emergency situations. Well, sort of. It’s a circuit able to generate an SOS signal in morse code.
Adam Billingsley’s entryis a card capable of delivering a text-based payload to your PC when connected via USB, sharing your key information (and ideally not something nefarious), and which also sets off an awesome rainbow animation. One of the best bits about this entry, however, it reportedly only costs $4 to make.
My persistance-of-vision business card 2.0 - YouTubeWatch On
My persistance-of-vision business card 2.0 - YouTube
My persistance-of-vision business card 2.0 - YouTube
Vying for the ‘most expensive’ category, if there is such a thing, is probably this one fromDimitarwith an e-ink display embedded in the front of it. That means it also requires a fairly large lithium battery.
My absolute favourite design, however, ischaosneon’s “persistence of vision” card, which you have to shake to reveal the text displayed on its handful of LEDs. This project, like some of the others, has been in the works for a good few years now—business card design is surprisingly popular on Hackaday.
The best bit about most of the designs—they’re open for others to copy and develop themselves.
Peak Storage(Image credit: Future)Best SSD for gaming: The best speedy storage today.Best NVMe SSD: Compact M.2 drives.Best external hard drives: Huge capacities for less.Best external SSDs: Plug-in storage upgrades.
Peak Storage
(Image credit: Future)Best SSD for gaming: The best speedy storage today.Best NVMe SSD: Compact M.2 drives.Best external hard drives: Huge capacities for less.Best external SSDs: Plug-in storage upgrades.
(Image credit: Future)
Best SSD for gaming: The best speedy storage today.Best NVMe SSD: Compact M.2 drives.Best external hard drives: Huge capacities for less.Best external SSDs: Plug-in storage upgrades.
The practicality of any of these cards is, uh, dubious at best. I struggled to get my company to pay for a couple hundred cardboard business cards for a trip to Taipei—what will it think when I submit my invoice for 200 tiny games consoles?
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