Editing The Pen Addict 22/transcript (section)

== Pen Tips ==


'''Brad Dowdy:''' It's like, you know, when, say you have a conical tip, say like your Sarasa. Okay. So the tip has a cone, it's a cone shape, right? Or like an arrow.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Right.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' And then it goes, then it goes into a flat spot.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Okay.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' You know, and normally when you click your Sarasa clip and you eject it, you can, the tip of the pen ejects just past that flat spot. Right.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Right.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So it looks, it's visually appealing when you write. It doesn't feel like it's just barely poking out the tip. Well, it doesn't come out that far. It's, it looks a little bit awkward.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Okay.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So I've let, I've talked to Joe about it and he said, yeah, that's something that they're working on. So I fully intend that they're going to, you know, work on that for that particular pen. And he said, there's a couple of them like that, that they're still working out some of the, some of the exact dimensions on. And they're going to, you know, they haven't made a final, a final master, master pen yet to build everything off, off of these. So there's definitely still tweaks being done, but it's really cool how they tried to make a pen that fits so many refills. I mean, that's what, that's, what's really people are raving about on this pen is like, man, look at all these, look at all these choices I have. And, oh, look, there's, you know, one of my favorites. Oh, there's another one of my favorites. I can just use this pen and carry around a pen case full of refills and just swap them out as I need. And that's the truth. I mean, it's, it's a, it's a really, really interesting project that I think they've, they've, from what I've seen so far in my limited time with this pen, that they, they've, they've pulled it off. I think, you know, there's several refills I didn't get to try, but it's really good. And that's, that's just the refills. That doesn't even, there's, there's so many other features about this pen just from the pen barrel. I mean, it's a titanium barrel. I mean, it's, it's really well, it's really well made. It's not overly heavy. It's kind of like a medium weight, medium weight pen. I don't know how to compare it to say like a, like a retro 51, maybe a hair lighter, something like that. Okay. You know, it's got a good weight. It's got a good balance. It's the, the cap, it, it threads on. So it's not a click cap. I mean, it's a metal pen. So it's not going to, you know, any kind of any type of click or snap. So it threads on the front and they've also put threading on the end of the pen. So you can post the cap just with one rotation of the threading. Now I found that that makes the pen a little bit long. You know, when you have, when you have caps that have to thread on the end of the pen to post. I mean, that's just the nature of the beast, right? You're, you're, you're used to, if you use a capped pen, you're used to taking the cap off and posting the cap on the end. Well, you know, the, the butt end of the pen usually goes halfway up the cap, right? It just kind of goes over it. Well, when you're using, doing a threaded, you know, a threaded posting, that's just the nature of the beast. It, it, it's a complete addition to the end of the pen. You know, you don't, you don't gain any of that space back. So it does feel a little bit long, but the weight of it is such that it's not uncomfortable to write with when it's posted.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' It's a little bit longer than like, probably take like a high tech C. And if you just imagine the, the cap being stuck on the end of the barrel instead of over the end of the barrel, that's about how long it is. So, um, and they've done, they've added some cool little features. So I, I didn't even mention this. It, it comes with a stylus on the end of the pen too. Um, I've got a review of a pen that, um, a company named Platinum made. Um, I'll, I'll have to look at it. I wasn't prepared to, to talk about it, but I just, I've reviewed it. I haven't posted the review on the Pen Antic blog and it's a little ballpoint pen retractable. It's, I got it off jet pens. Um, it's a platinum mini ballpoint with stylus. Basically it's a retractable ballpoint. I was like, Oh, this is cool. And I got the stylus and I wrote up the review. I used the pen for a while and the stylus is just horrible. It does not work worth a flip. You know, every touch was taken two or three touches and swipes weren't working and I was getting over it. It was very unresponsive. So I, cause the only other stylus I've used is the Cosmonaut, which, you know, that's not a pen, you know, that's just a stylus, which we both use and love. So I was anxious to try on this, on the solid titanium pen. I was, I didn't have very high hopes for the stylus. I was like, Oh, is it going to be as bad as that platinum was? And, and it worked right out the gate, you know, first touch, first tap, first swipe. And, and that's, that was on my iPhone with the, uh, with the OtterBox cover, which, you know, a lot of people use those. They can have a thick screen protector on that, which sometimes, you know, styluses have a tough time with and not this one. It, it worked right out the gate. I was very happy with it. Um, and you also have an option to unscrew that stylus and just kind of have a cap end for it. They made a, like a little screw, screw cap, just to kind of square off the end of the pin. Um, if you don't use, if, if you don't have any touch, a touchscreen device and don't want the stylus, there's a, a matching, a matching cap for you to put on the end. And they, they've added little finishing touches like the, um, you know, the, the periodic table of the elements, little TI, uh, symbol, like in the square, they've, they've, um,

'''Brad Dowdy:''' it's not an, it's not an engraving on the, on the clip. It's more like a, a stamped, uh, on the clip. It looks, it looks pretty cool. It's a very kind of minimalistic design and it's got that little stamp, um, on there, which is, um, very well done. The clip's sturdy. I, I mean, you know, they have a, they have a couple of tweaks to make as they finalize it. But, you know, if you follow their project on Kickstarter, you look at all the updates, you see how hard they're working at it. You know that they're going to, um, you know, nail this down right by the final, by the time the, uh, final pin ship. And, you know, they might even, if they can find some more refills to fit, um, fit on the list, they'll probably add those too, because, um, it, it, it fits a lot of pin, fits a lot of refills. Um, I did try, you know, I saw a lot of people in the, in the, in the backer comment section on the Kickstarter page, you know, asking what about this refill? What about that refill? I did try the standard high tech C refill and the standard Sino DX refill, and they definitely don't fit. Um, so, I mean, and they've been upfront about that in the beginning, you know, they say which ones fit and which ones don't. Those are always on the don't fit list. And I verified they're not even close. Um, I don't think it's even something you could hack and make it fit. Um, but, um, overall, you know, I'm, I'm very happy with this pin. I appreciate these guys letting me get an early look. And I know so many people have been asking me about it. So, um, you know, if you listen to this episode and you have more questions about this pin, you can, you know, hit me up on Twitter at Dowdyism or go to the pin addicts, pin addict.com. Slash contact, shoot me any questions you have. I'll try to answer them. If I have some other refills that you have that I haven't tested out, I'll try to test them out. Um, I tried to test out most everything I had. And, um, you know, if it was on this list, it pretty much worked except for the couple that I mentioned and they're still working on that. So, you know, it's a, it's a, this has been one of the better Kickstarter projects, um, that I've seen. And I, I've certainly never had so many questions about it. So I'm glad, um, I really appreciate Chadwick and Joe sending me these so I can at least, you know, answer some questions that people are having about backing the project. So, you know, I, I hope to have my pin addict review finished and posted by Friday, which is tomorrow. Um, if not, then it'll be Monday, but I think I can get it done for tomorrow. We'll see.