Jon Stam has designed an RFID curiosity cabinet. The cabinet is lined on both sides with drawers and boxes. The drawers contain objects, while the boxes contain a USB memory stick and an RFID chip. Placing the box near an RFID reader, causes the digital content to be displayed.
matandme has more photos info about this. DesignGuide.tv interview with Jon showing the cabinet off is after the jump.
The thing that drew me to this cabinet was the clean lines of it. When I first saw this, I had no idea it was RFID enabled. I particularly like the pulls on the drawers, or more precisely the lack of them. Many times when there’s pull-less drawers, the outer panel is beveled for fingers to. In his design the pull is simply the main drawer face, with a second panel inset slightly inside to completely close of the drawer when it’s closed.
One thing I don’t like about his design is that the digital curios are separate from the physical curios. I’m don’t think that distinction needs to be made. Digital objects don’t completely replace physical objects, (recordings, both audio and visual, excepted) but are complimenting them. For instance, when I traveled to Beijing, all my photos were digital, but those aren’t my only souvenirs. I have a Mao Book, a wad of cash, receipts, and tickets. It’s this collection, both physical and digital that commemorate my trip. It seems that a cabinet that attempts to recognize this dual nature of modern memories, should completely integrate them, rather than treat them as different things. If the each drawer contained the digital memories associated with the physical object contained in it, then this would be the case.