News special: digital trading cards

Is the future of trading cards digital? A number of American manufacturers want us to think so. Last year, New York-based company CyberAction caught the attention of collectors when it announced that it would be producing ranges of interactive trading cards designed to be viewed on computer screen. CyberAction cards are bought and downloaded from the company's web site and viewed through a special piece of software known as The CyberViewer. Each CyberAction card includes features such as full motion video and sound, as well as traditional text based information. To date, CyberAction has produced non-sport sets featuring favourites such as Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, Xena Warrior Princess and Star Trek.

Industry giant Upper Deck is also manufacturing interactive digital cards. Upper Deck's new PowerDeck cards are CD-ROM based and have features similar to those seen on the CyberAction cards. The CD-ROMs are actually shaped like regular trading cards, allowing collectors to store them in binder pages. The CD-ROMs can be played through almost any computer's CD-ROM drive.

The idea of digital trading cards is by no means a new one. In 1993, Warner Bros. produced a digital Babylon 5 card to promote its popular sci-fi show. The company allowed collectors to copy and redistribute the card, on the condition that it was not modified. The card itself was nothing more than a static computer image file.

It appears somewhat difficult to place a value on the Babylon 5 card, since one can never be sure exactly how many copies of it exist. Many of the commercial digital card sets are produced in limited quantities and so it may be possible to place a value on them. The cards are not designed to be copied and passed on to other collectors - CyberAction, for example, gives each of its cards a unique serial number that acts as a means of copy protection. It is only possible to view the cards on the computer to which they were downloaded.

There have been mixed reactions amongst collectors to digital trading cards. Some have argued that digital cards are not contributing to the development of the hobby at all but are instead completely changing it. Will the trading card collections of the future merely consist of a set of computer disks? Only time will tell.

Related links

http://www.cyberaction.com

http://www.upperdeck.com