I’m increasingly amazed by the cheapness and memory capacity of USB thumbdrives. There are many documented attempts to make a workable RAID* array using these devices.
Today’s invention is another such attempt.
Instead, however, of connecting a small number of these in the conventional way, into a common hub, I propose that each drive should have a USB connector on either end. This would therefore allow drives to be chained together (using flexible connectors), offering the prospect of a) a unified, massively scalable, logical memory system and b) a wearable storage belt, capable of being adopted as a consumer fashion item.
This might best take the form of two parallel ‘memory ropes, ‘ providing increased redundancy (either by mirroring: copying data to several disks or striping: splitting data between disks) in the event of some breakage under flexure. Someone seems to have picked up on the idea here and more recently, here.
*(Redundant Array of Inexpensive (or Independent) Drives (or Disks))
