The story goes that Rowling penned her initial idea for the Harry Potter series on a napkin while on a train from Manchester to London in 1990. Anyone who has ever written a story idea down on a napkin knows what Rowling went through on that delayed train to London.
It begins as a desperate search for a scrap of material large enough to hold your idea and substantial enough to hold up to a pen. After furiously scribbling and folding the piece, you pray that it will make it home and that’s you’ll remember to put it by the computer and not in the wash.
Trapped!
Have you ever noticed that inspiration always comes knocking when you’re on a plane, in the car, taking a shower or stuck on a train? What is it about being trapped that activates ideas that urges us to grab a pen and lean in to scribble furiously? Yet, there is something about that precise combination of isolation from our usual activities, coupled with just enough freedom to think and write, that seems to be the perfect equation for creation.
Imagine It. Write It. Save It!
Now, imagine having a notebook and a pen to get your ideas down on paper and immediately upload your writing to the computer…. wouldn’t that be perfect? Even when we’re sure that we’ll remember our ideas, there’s something magical about the act of writing them down on paper that cements them, makes them real and viable. While it’s great to type them out on an iPad or a computer, we don’t always have that luxury. In fact, the best ideas seem to arrive when we’re as far away from technology as we can possibly get.
Livescribe 3
Livescribe Smartpen Portfolio
(Paper) Size Matters
That’s why Rowling would have loved a Livescribe 3. Livescribe not only lets you write in a notebook and save your work to the computer (which is already a huge time-saver), but it also offers everything from college-sized notebooks to small, easy-to-carry notepads about the size of a dollar bill. You can write in the park or in the car, on the train or in your local café without missing a beat. And without losing that café napkin. It would be amazing if that was all Livescribe did. Yet, this title pen does even more.
Sometimes you don’t want to write. You just want to get the free flow of ideas down without searching for words. Livescribe helps with that, too. It allows you to record as you talk. And it uses your smartphone or tablet’s microphone to record audio that’s synchronized to everything you write on paper. Brilliant!
Plot, Plan & Pen
And you can do even more. Your notebooks and notepads upload, convert what you write into digital text with amazing accuracy and allow you to search that text. You can even sync to up to 4 iOS and Android devices with your Livescribe.
Are you a plotter and a planner? You can organize your uploaded notes, tag them, playback your audio and send or share notes to your devices.
Livescribe 3 pen has a perfect weight, too. It’s a sleek writing implement with a Swiss tip that flows easily across the page. The notebooks are well-made and classic–a pleasure to carry anywhere. You can even find them in moleskin to use with the Livescribe.
So the next time you find yourself trapped on a train or sitting down to write in the café, don’t reach for a napkin. Pen the next bestseller on a Livescribe and make your writing life infinitely easier.
The Best Seller
Your Livescribe works side-by-side with Evernote, too. It is –in my humble opinion–the essential writing tool. I use it and recommend it. It’s the only tool that you can carry with you, use on the go and come home to handwritten, dictated, typed and uploaded notes without doing a thing. Yes, there are iPads and notepads, other apps and pens… I’ve used them all and discarded them all. I use Livescribe for its versatility and for the way it feels when I push that pen across the page.
It feels like a best seller in the making.
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