thumb drives are so five minutes ago...it’s 16GB SDHC cards and such (maybe 32 or 64 GB now)...
My first computer in the 80s, cost $7000~ IBM. It had a 10 or 20 MB hard drive (I forget)! Remember 5 1/4 inch floppies? The floppies at work I used were 8 inchers!
While SDHC cards are good for carrying data (you usually find them in digital cameras), not too many servers and workstations have ports for the cards built in - you usually need either a USB card reader, or have a laptop with the card reader built in.
On the other hand, every computer built in the last 10-15 years has USB ports for a thumb drive.
Most "enterprise" computers don't have card readers, while they all have USB ports.
Of course I guess you could just get a USB card reader, buy why bother when you've got 64GB or 128GB USB "thumb" drives?
Remember 5 1/4 inch floppies? The floppies at work I used were 8 inchers!
You trying to "start a war here" for the "oldest tech?" ;-)
Mark