Wallet pens
One of things I lamented when I replaced my Treo with a Pre was that since the Pre uses a capacitive touchscreen, it doesn’t use a stylus, so I no longer had my Treo’s combination stylus/ballpoint pen wherever I went. There have been numerous times where the pen came in handy, and after I switched to the Pre, there have been numerous times where I’ve found myself not having a pen when I needed one. I’ve been looking for a good wallet pen as a substitute but haven’t found anything appealing:
- The Wallet Pen—the one recommended by Oprah—is $50 (a 3-pack costs a staggering $125). I think Oprah must be one of the few people who thinks it’s affordable. If I put that in my wallet, it’d be the most valuable thing in it.
- The Derringer Pen is much cheaper at $8 (a 5-pack costs $32), although that still seems expensive to my inner miser.
- The FoldzFlat pen is a cheap plastic pen for $2 (or $25 for a stainless version) that folds into the form factor of a thick credit card. This is the right price, but my wallet has enough credit card-sized things in it already.
Last week the obvious occurred to me: I could carry the stylus/pen from my Treo in my wallet. Duh. It’s thin, it has a sturdy metal barrel, and it even has a cap. It doesn’t have a clip, but I think that’s okay since a clip would add to the bulk. I think it’s thinner than either the Wallet Pen or the Derringer pen. It fits easily but snugly into the bill compartment of my wallet.
The price is reasonable: it’s effectively free for me since I bought a 3-pack of them years ago, but normally a 3-pack costs around $10–15. It’s a third-party accessory, and there are various companies that produce and sell different versions for different PDAs, so it’s possible to shop around too.
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Why do you need it? I used to be obsessive about carrying a pen, but having a smartphone sort of obviated the need, so these days, I find I don’t normally carry a pen and never miss it.
An alternative is the little swiss army knives with pens to keep on a keychain. those knives actually often seem to come in useful, though I stopped carrying those around after TSA confiscated the 5th one.
— Ben @ January 18, 2010, 10:08 am (PT)
As useful as a smartphone is, having a pen can be faster (I don’t need to turn my phone on, enter my unlock code, run an app, …). It’s more useful if I need to make a quick diagram of something (drawing on smartphones is even worse now with the capacitive touchscreens that rely on finger input). It’s also useful to annotate existing paper documents. Strangers have, on occasion, asked me if I had a pen they could borrow for a moment (although admittedly answering, “No” and going about my own business would be more personally convenient).
I’d consider a Swiss Army Knife with a pen accessory if I didn’t already have a Swiss Army Knife (not a model with a pen, though). I’d also be afraid that I’d end up losing the pen.
I remember to detach my Swiss Army Knife and drop it into my checked luggage when I get to the airport.
— James @ January 18, 2010, 12:13 pm (PT)
You don’t know what you are missing…
Tell me where to send you one and I’ll bet you will be a convert.
Well designed things make smart people smarter.
Thanks for the mention.
Tom O’Brien, Pen maker and shipping clerk.
— Tom O'Brien @ January 21, 2010, 9:16 am (PT)
REI has got a space wallet pen that is a bit pricy but works really well – even upside down. I’m happy to be free of carrying around a stylus with the Newton, Magic Cap, or Palm Pilot that I used to carry around in highschool – but not carrying a stylus doesn’t make it any harder to carry a small pen. I lost my space pen from REI and think i’m going to pick up another one to carry in my wallet…
— Rishi O. @ January 29, 2010, 12:39 pm (PT)