Editing The Pen Addict 151/transcript (section)

== Visionaire Pen ==


'''Brad Dowdy:''' All right. So you brought something special to me to test out for the first time ever at the Atlanta Pen Show. A pen I have lusted after and desired for well over a year. So why don't you tell everyone about what you brought me?

'''Myke Hurley:''' Well, I still stand by the fact that this was the rarest and maybe most anticipated. Pen of the Pen Show, which was the Visionaire. Because nobody else had one. Right. And everyone wanted to see it. Literally, I had people saying, did you bring it? I brought it and I get it out and show people. And everyone had the same sort, like a similar kind of reaction. But I want to hear you say it first before I spoil your thoughts. But this is basically the Brad trying the Visionaire for the first time is going to be in the Kickstarter video. So we did it just after the show. And that currently, we're hoping to have that out very early May. We'll have some more to say on that shortly. There is 150 gigabytes of photos and videos that needs to be looked through by Stephen, Mark and Josh. The great people who came down to Stephen of RelayFM fame. Who came down to help us out with that. And they were fantastic. And I've seen some pictures. And those guys, they really know what's going on. And I'm so, so excited to share the video with you guys. But we'll have more to say on that shortly. They just need to start going through it.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yes, so the Visionaire. Here's the best way I can explain it in pen show terms. So you have the silver metal barrel. And if I saw that pen sitting on someone's table at the show, like in one of their trays of their pen displays, I would see it sitting there and I would reach out and pick it up. I absolutely would. It's pretty good looking just from an external aesthetic. That's a point of view.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Except for the engraving.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Except for the engraving.

'''Myke Hurley:''' The engraving is like comical.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. So that's not good. But just in general terms, if I saw it sitting there, I would probably reach for it and pick it up. And then it kind of all falls apart from there. Figuratively and literally. So when you arrived, you traveled with your fountain pens inked up. And you did have a little bit of a leaking problem out the nibs of some of them, including the Visionaire.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Which that was the worst. Yeah.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So the Visionaire was the worst. And not just that. The other ones cleaned right up. You cleaned the Visionaire 2 and then found it leaking the next day and the next day and the next day. It's just a really poorly made pen. Yeah.

'''Myke Hurley:''' There's no getting around it. The whole time. The whole time. There was always, always ink on the nib.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. So the weight was good. The style was good. The feel was off because it just wasn't mechanically sound. It didn't feel like I talk a lot about when you're writing with a pen that you really don't notice the pen. It's like one coherent unit and there shouldn't be any rattling movement, odd spaces, anything. And the Visionaire doesn't have that. It's not a good feeling pen in the hand. And then when you go to write with it, the nib is super average. You can tell it's a very generic nib. There wasn't necessarily anything wrong with the nib. It wasn't overly scratchy. It wrote. It wrote okay. But if I handed you any other pen that was sitting around and you compared the two side by side, you'd go, you would like the other one better. It's just, it's everything that we thought it was, right? It's a very low dollar mass produced pen. You know, it's like a five or ten dollar pen that you would just buy and destroy and then buy another one. It's essentially a disposable fountain pen for what it was. And yeah, I don't have anything really good to say about it. I don't have anything extraordinarily bad to say about it. It's just not very good. Yep. So, I mean, and we'll cover more of that in the video. But you could tell pretty quickly how poor of a pen it was once you had it in your hands. So, I feel sorry for anyone who spent their money on that. And luckily, it wasn't too, too much to be a huge deal breaker. So, that's our Visionaire love. And, you know, that's, it's pretty amazing that the Visionaire has made it this far just in our talking. I know. But it's like still a thing. It's, it's become like a meme, if you will. It's just, there's always something you can relate to the Visionaire. And, you know, we love signing birth certificates with it.

'''Myke Hurley:''' So, for everybody that like, everybody that tries to, that asks me about it, the way that I try and explain this is, it's not a good pen. It's not a bad pen. Which is fine. The problem is, is the way he marketed it. Yep. If he took out the birth certificate thing and just said, like, I've worked really hard on the design with people in China or whatever. I think he probably could have had a similar result to what he had. I also have a different theory about this pen, which I shared with you. Is that we have all slightly misunderstood what the original pitch was. And that it's actually been tested and it works really, really well on the paper they use the birth certificates. That's my new theory. And that we just slightly misunderstood what he was saying. And it's basically just the perfect pen for signing a birth certificate with.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' That's my new theory about the vision. All right. We'll go with that. And I'm going to let you go with that. And I think we will end it on that and go sign some birth certificates. Sounds like a great idea. Yeah.

'''Myke Hurley:''' So, we're now on our way to episode 200 because we're episode 151. That's where you'll find the show notes for this week. Relay.fm slash penaddict slash 151 or in the show, your favorite podcast app of choice. If you want to find us online, there's a couple of ways you can do that. You can find Brad at penaddict.com. He is also at dowdyism, D-O-W-D-Y-I-S-M on Twitter and penaddict on Instagram. I am at imike, I-M-Y-K-E on Twitter and Instagram. And you can find more shows that I'm on and that we do over at relay.fm. Thanks again to our sponsors this week, Harry's, Dudak Modern Goods, and Warby Parker. And we'll be back next week. Until then, say goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Thank you.

[[Category:Podcast Transcripts]]
[[Category:The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript]]