from Hacker News

Norway’s new passport – already a design classic?

by hiphopyo on 1/7/17, 8:39 PM with 71 comments

• by Inconel on 1/8/17, 12:52 AM

  Along the same lines as this new passport here are some cool design proposals from Metric[1] and Snohetta[2] for Norway's new banknotes.

  And a couple of concepts from US based designers[3][4] for US currency designs.

  [1]http://www.metricdesign.no/work/norges-bank

  [2]http://snohetta.com/projects/200-design-proposal-for-norway3...

  [3]http://www.travispurrington.com/2014-usd-proposal

  [4]http://tyznik.com/currency/

  Edit: I thought Travis Purrington was US based but he is actually Zurich based.

• by grkvlt on 1/8/17, 5:30 AM

  Not as cool as Finland, though. Their passport design features a moose on each page, which doubles as a flip-book animation of it walking! See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ym4v2TBJwuI

• by gumby on 1/8/17, 8:10 AM

  Interesting that the pass just has Norwegian (Bokmål and Nynorsk) and English -- no French. Is French no longer the Lingua Franka? My kid's German passport still has German / English / French and my Australian one is still English / French.

  I've used French in some weird remote corners of the world where English didn't work.

• by lb1lf on 1/7/17, 9:47 PM

  The new passports will not be issued until April 2018.

  I just realised I'll end up with one of the first ones - my current spare passport expires on March 31st, 2018.

• by kwhitefoot on 1/8/17, 11:44 AM

  This story is from 2014. And also the ID card is just a proposal, I've been living here for over thirty years and I have never heard of a Norwegian having an ID card.

• by zoom6628 on 1/8/17, 12:18 AM

  All cred to Norway for doing their part to make a passport something usable and something a citizen can show with pride. However not a patch on current New Zealand passport design. Everywhere i take mine out for use i get comments about how cool and yet elegant it looks - inside and out.

• by zaatar on 1/8/17, 1:46 AM

  What is the difference between an "immigrant passport" and a "standard passport" ? Are naturalized citizens of Norway not equal to natural citizens of Norway?

• by seanmcdirmid on 1/8/17, 3:13 AM

  These are so cool! How do I get one?

  American passports are so drab in comparison. Another nice passport design is Swiss, but that shouldn't be surprising.

• by carlob on 1/7/17, 9:59 PM

  (2014)

• by cantrevealname on 1/7/17, 10:29 PM

  I've been thinking that the security function served by a passport is very rapidly becoming obsolete (or at least redundant) for travel to most countries in the world. It could be replaced by a plastic photo ID card -- which you could then call a "passport" I suppose. And with strong biometrics, it could be replaced by nothing.

  Let me explain this with typical cases where a passport is used:

  (1) You're entering your home country with your passport. Pretty much at every secure border crossing, they're going to use your passport number to pull up absolutely every bit of info that appears in your passport, including your photo, plus a lot more info from the home country's computers. The passport serves at most as a "something you have" security token. They already have your photo, so the only case where the physical passport helps is avoiding impersonation by someone closely resembling you.

  (2) You're traveling to a foreign country that needs a visa. In that case, you will have submitted a ton of information, including your photo, to the foreign country in advance to get the visa. When you arrive at the foreign country, it's just like case (1) above.

  (3) You're traveling to a foreign country that doesn't need a visa from citizens of your home country. In this case, the proof you need is that you are a citizen of that country. It is likely that the two countries have exchanged a mass of information to make the visa-free travel possible, or they can share the info about visitors in real time as they arrive.

  It's really the edge cases that the physical passport helps. Like obscure border crossings where they don't have an electronic feed, or very third-world countries, or as a recognizable document to show to hotels/banks/airlines within a foreign country.

  By the way, I'm not saying that this is a good development. In fact, it's a terrible loss of privacy and furthering of worldwide surveillance. But it seems to be the trend, like the elimination of cash.

• by TazeTSchnitzel on 1/7/17, 10:22 PM

  It's a distinctive, minimalist design, for sure. Hopefully it's still as usable as before. Though ICAO passport specifications mean designers probably aren't given enough rope to hang themselves.

• by moomin on 1/7/17, 11:51 PM

  I find it hilarious that the related articles includes this: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/architecture-design... , which basically details how the UK government has managed to make an utter mess of the same exact design space.

• by mrmondo on 1/8/17, 6:08 AM

  That is truly wonderful design, I'm genuinely drawn to it and quite envious, until now I thought the current New Zealand passport was quite pleasant - http://i.stuff.co.nz/travel/kiwi-traveller/84012074/the-migh...

• by thewhitetulip on 1/8/17, 6:35 AM

  If I am not wrong, Chinese passports are also similar beautiful design and different pages show different things under UV light.

• by CalRobert on 1/8/17, 11:37 AM

  A thread relevant to this discussion - why do we require passports?

  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12621909

• by microcolonel on 1/8/17, 6:52 AM

  I have to say, when I got my U.S. passport I found it striking. My Canadian passport is pretty bland even though it has the same format (backdrop image and a quote).

• by drxerious on 1/8/17, 1:55 AM

  I like the design, although they do remind me a bit of the little Kate Spade notebooks and accessories you find at upmarket department stores..

• by charlesdm on 1/8/17, 1:02 AM

  I seriously love the design of this passport. Well done to the company that designed those.

• by masklinn on 1/8/17, 11:41 AM

  Needs a [2014] tag:

  > Monday 17 November 2014 15.29 GMT

  > Last modified on Monday 17 November 2014 18.40 GMT

• by pdog on 1/8/17, 12:32 AM

  What does it take to become a citizen of Norway? Asking for a friend.