14 DAY TRIAL // In trying to market their products, hardware developers and manufacturers have been going out of their way to make USB flash drives that are smaller, lighter, more stylish or more storage-capable than those released by their competitors. As a new marketing strategy, Active Media Products seems to have gone outside of the IT industry and, instead of including some special, exclusive software or technology in its new drive, it chose to appeal to end-users' artistic sensibility.
The new product from Active Media Products is the Ken Elkinson USB flash drive and is named after the pianist Ken Elkinson, whose songs come as part of the product, already inscribed into the drive's memory.
"I'm thrilled to be partnering with AMP on this product," Ken Elkinson stated. "These six songs are an excellent cross-section of my music that I picked myself."
The product is very small, measuring a minuscule 1.6 x 0.6 x 0.2 inches. Despite this very small size, however, it can come with a 2GB, 4GB, 8GB and 16GB storage capacity, all the while maintaining the ability to reach 200X transfer speeds. Not only that, but the drive itself is waterproof, offering good protection to the six MP3 tracks included in each copy of the product. The tracks are six of Elkinson's piano solos.
It is quite recommended that the general storage-purpose Ken Elkinson folding USB flash drive be partnered with a key chain in order to avoid, or at least reduce, the chances of permanently misplacing it. The device has a hologram of the Statue of Liberty on its front, alluding to Elkinson's origins (he hails from New York) and is already selling through Amazon.com.
The price of the drives starts at $9.95 for the 2GB version, growing according to the capacity increase. The specific prices of the other models are of $15.95 for the 4GB one, of $19.55 for the 8GB model and of $39.95 for the 16GB drive.