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The spiral-shaped pen refill carries twice as much ink as a regular refill

How do you fit double the ink into the refill of a ballpen? By twisting the tube into a spiral, that’s how. Called the T&T Pen-Ink Chamber, the helical coil fits into any regular pen barrel and sits there for twice as long as a normal refill.

The concept design makes much the refill’s reduced environmental impact, claiming that you’ll create less plastic waste as you’ll be tossing away fewer pens. But what about the refill itself? The normal, skinny refills can be packed close together into shipping boxes, whereas the spiral will take up a lot more space. Still, it’s worth it, if only because most people throw away pens when they’re empty.

Double the ink means double the fun!

Or do they? I rarely get to finish all the ink in a pen before it breaks. You’ll be familiar with the problem: somehow, no matter whether it is stored nib up, nib down or horizontally, the tar-like, bitter-tasting* ink will slowly creep up the tube until it reaches the top, and it will then stickily ooze into the barrel of the pen itself. This is what needs to be fixed. Putting more ink into a spiral tube is just loading up more ink to be wasted later.

Spiral Makes a Difference [Yanko]

*No. I don’t remember how I know what the ink tastes like. I just know.

See Also:

• Pink Tactical Pen Sends Mixed Messages
• Dead Pen Challenge: Biro Cutlery Hack
• Metal Pen with Level and Screwdriver
• Rubber Pen Organiser Wraps Around Notebooks

Microsoft and Nokia’s industry-altering announcement of a strategic alliance back in February has today been bolstered with the signing of a definitive agreement between the two companies. In announcing the inking of the paperwork, the Microkia crew point out that they’re already hard at work developing “a portfolio” of Nokia Windows Phone devices, which will be shipping “in volume” in 2012, but there’s still a twinkling hope that they can get something out on the market in 2011. Nokia devs have started porting key applications and services to Windows Phone, with mapping and navigation getting a highlight mention, while there will indeed be a “Nokia-branded global application store that leverages the Windows Marketplace infrastructure.” Notably, this is described as a single portal where devs can serve their apps to users of Windows Phone, Symbian and Series 40 devices — it’ll be interesting to see how they work out the details of that. There’s also confirmation that Microsoft will pay Nokia multiple billions of dollars as part of the agreement, some of which will be spent on completing an intellectual property-sharing agreement between the two teams. So yes, the third ecosystem is well and truly on its way.

Continue reading Nokia and Microsoft sign definitive agreement, bring Windows Phone handsets closer to realization

Nokia and Microsoft sign definitive agreement, bring Windows Phone handsets closer to realization originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 21 Apr 2011 06:57:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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You really should pay attention when Engadget’s founder, Peter Rojas speaks about the tech industry. Especially when he leads into a story like this:

It’s something of an open secret that Amazon is working on an Android tablet and I am 99 percent certain they are having Samsung build one for them.

The GDGT piece goes on to present a very reasoned argument that paints Amazon, not Samsung or the rest of the traditional consumer electronics industry, as Apple’s chief competition in the near-term tablet space. An idea that’ll be tough to argue against if Amazon — with its combined music (downloadable and streaming), video, book, and app ecosystem — can actually launch a dirt-cheap, highly-customized, 7-inch Android tablet this summer as Pete predicts. Oh, and the fact that Amazon already has our credit card details will certainly make for easy adoption. Hit the source below for the full read or, better yet, stay tuned for the next Engadget Show where we’ll be nerding-out with the son of the father of the father of Engadget.

Amazon to take on Apple this summer with Samsung-built tablet? originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 21 Apr 2011 06:35:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Wacom’s Bamboo Stylus is yet another rubber-tipped iPad pen

Wacom, the maker of graphics tablets for Macs and PCs, will now sell you a stylus for your iPad. When I read this news, I got pretty excited: It’s from Wacom, so it must be pressure sensitive, right? Maybe it measures how hard you press and sends that info via Bluetooth to a custom app?

Sadly, the answers are no and no. The Bamboo Stylus (named for Wacom’s Bamboo tablets) is little more than a regular metal tube with a rubber tip. The tip is thinner than is found on many other styluses, and the design is in the familiar “fuglitarian” (fugly utilitarian) style that Wacom has made its own, but this is still just a dumb pen.

Normally I’d recommend Wacom every time. The company makes the best tablets I have used (although the driver software is so bad that it would be a joke even on Linux). But making yet another iPad stylus seems pointless, unless they are made to be given away as schwag at tradeshows. And perhaps they are — as of this writing, there is still no price associated with the Bamboo Stylus (not to be confused with the Bamboo Pen, sold as a replacement part for the tablet).

Bamboo Stylus product page [Wacom]

See Also:

• Magnetic Stylus Sticks to Your iPad
• Fingers-On With The Chunky Alupen iPad Stylus
• Brush Stylus Paints on iPad
• Tip-Slip: Tablet Stylus Slides Onto Sharpie, Bic
• Korean iPhone Stylus: It's Made of Meat
• Pointless iPhone Stylus Gets its Own Case
• New Wacom Tablet Goes Wireless
• Wacom Bamboo Replaces Graphire

Humans, they just love mixing the old with the new. To wit, the iCade gaming cabinet for the iPad, an April Fools’ joke that was just a fun idea this time last year, has gone and turned very real, replete with FCC certification and now a pre-order page. The Bluetooth-communicating iPad enclosure seems to have originally been on sale for immediate delivery, but ThinkGeek has burned through its first shipment of units faster than you can say “Atari’s Greatest Hits.” The second batch of $100 iCades is expected by May 20th at the very latest, although orders are being taken only from the US for now. The rest of the world needn’t despair, however — we hear building one of your own is a pleasurable and rewarding experience.

iCade arcade cabinet for iPad starts selling at $100, already on backorder originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 21 Apr 2011 05:41:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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