I thought that if it cut my daily average note-taking and retyping time by even 10 minutes, it would be worth it. I’ve found it to be more helpful than that. How the pen works The Livescribe 3 works like a typical ball - point pen in that you hold it in your hand, reveal the writing tip, and write on paper.I’m also guessing that you work with real people and your business might even be shifting physical product. And, out there, with them, we use pen and paper – see the problem?MyScript for Livescribe. Original Printable Notepads.So……I reflected on an earlier conversation with my friend Rob May over at Ramsac and bought myself an Echo Smartpen – that was almost 3 months ago and now I’m nailing my colours to the mast because it works well and meets my ‘Rules for Tools’ criteria: So, here’s how I have squared the circle… Why my Montblanc pen has been replaced by my Echo Smartpen for business writingI loved writing my meeting notes into my beautifully crafted, Italian leather bound journal with my masterful Montblanc Meisterstuck – I just got fed up with turning the pages back at the desk and rewriting it all into Outlook emails and Tasks, into my CRM system and into Microsoft Word and other digital collateral. It integrates seamlessly with my other productivity toolsSo, there you have it, Richard ‘Mr Productivity’ Maybury recommends the Echo SmartpenUse the non-affiliate links ( I dislike them as much as you do!) to find out more:Discover more about the Echo from the official (Non-affiliate) Livescribe Echo site I bought mine in a great package that beat the Amazon deal from (Non-affiliate) Micro-Anvika Make sure you grab a pen refill pack along with your order.One important point to add at this stage, you will want to grab the ‘Myscript for Livescribe’ package to turn your handwritten notes into editable text through the magic of OCR for US$30I have already been asked for some leverage tips on how I use my Echo Smartpen in my business, so stand by for that. Meanwhile if you have any comments or questions just drop them in the comments section below or call me on 01428 607763 for a brief chat.Any high-tech or low-tech tool that helps us to be more efficient is something just about any attorney (or anyone else) will appreciate. For attorneys, efficiency helps us be both saner and more profitable in our practice. We’re All Pressed for TimeAttorneys, and just about everyone else, seem to be short on time. This post describes why I decided to try the Livescribe 3 smartpen see how it works and how I use, what I like about it, and what needs improvement. If it involves technology, even better.
![]() But paperless doesn’t necessarily mean zero-paper. That was not efficient!I imagine most of us have heard of the benefits of a paperless office: portability and accessibility of documents, searchability, reduced expense of storage, reduced risk of loss with redundant backups, security (still need electronic security), and more. The downside was that I would spend up to an hour every day retyping my notes into my law-practice management software, so that they would be text searchable alongside each record of a meeting, phone call, or note on a project. I’d found, in my practice, that I tended to take notes on client meetings and phone calls by hand, as that was less distracting to me than using a laptop or mobile device. Download empire total warWith those goals of increased efficiency and less paper in mind, I decided to try the Livescribe 3 pen. But I wanted a faster way to get my notes into electronic form (and I didn’t want to spend time every night tearing apart my notebooks and scanning them). There are times when paper works better—sometimes far better—than taking notes on a desktop, laptop, tablet or phone: client meetings, phone calls, on the road, or a plane, or when the battery is running low!In short, I was not willing to give up using paper for notes. It is often less distracting to me, and to the person I’m talking with or listening to, to take notes on paper. I find that I remember things better when I write them down—and there are studies supporting this, such as this one (Mueller and Oppenheimer, 2014) and this (Mangen and Velay, 2011). I like a physical record of some things, such as notes from client meetings. An infrared camera in the barrel, to capture what you write as you write it. But it does more than that, with several non-traditional-pen parts: How the Pen WorksThe Livescribe 3 smartpen works like a typical ballpoint pen, in that you hold it in your hand, reveal the writing tip (take off the cap, click the spring-loaded top, etc.), and write on paper. I’ve found it to be more helpful than that. ![]() My Livescribe Download And PrintYou can buy them in a range of sizes, or download and print your own, so you could use looseleaf and bind it, or file pages (or shred them—which may be attractive to the security-conscious, see below under security concerns). Each page has a pattern of dots that tell the software the page of the particular notebook you’re using, and where on the page you are. In my experience, 2GB of data storage on the pen has been plenty for a full day of writing (and the pen battery lasts more than a day, too).You do need to write on special dot-pattern paper. When you connect later, it will download. You can also use the pen without the mobile device present, or the app open. ![]() You can also create a reminder from the text selected—it’s not perfect but gets it into Apple’s Reminders app—and you can work with an address like you would any other text that iOS recognizes as an address, including creating a contact or launching in Maps.You can move page images out of the Livescribe+ app as PDFs to Evernote, OneNote, or any apps that can open PDFs or images—they open as PDFs, allowing you to zoom way in (which is great if you later have trouble reading what you wrote). If another person would have trouble reading your writing, so will the app!You can copy and paste text in the app, and edit the transcriptions (it initially said “cold-fusion reactor” instead of “cold-fusion realtor”), though I often do that on the computer if I need to edit my notes.After conversion from handwriting, you can edit, attach photos or notes to a text section, copy, delete, add tags, share a feed section, or merge more than one together (which is useful for putting all of a meeting’s or CLE’s notes together). I’ve found it works well, though I do have to write relatively neatly. It supports many languages of handwriting, though I’ve only tried English. I find it to be very portable (the “flip” notebook is sized like a reporter’s pad) and durable (I’ve dropped the pen on tile floors several times), and easy to use: just twist the ring and start writing.As part of my daily routine, I review my notes in the evening, and I convert my writing to text, and move what I need into my practice management system.The text transcription happens locally on your mobile device—you don’t need to be connected to the Internet to do it, and Livescribe assured me that they don’t have access to your data. Note that you should be very mindful of audio recordings and wiretap laws—start with the Digital Media Law Project’s excellent summary of laws on recording conversations, and see below in my discussion of security concerns. You can start and control a recording from the app, or from controls printed onto the paper, but only if the app is open and the device is already paired. The pen doesn’t have a microphone, though it alerts you (and anyone who can see your pen) when the app is recording by changing the indicator light to red. The camera is focused for the page, about an inch away, and it has to resolve the lines of ink and the dot pattern—and they’re small—so I don’t think it would be able to pick up anything other than a very blurry picture, unless you’re holding the pen an inch or so from the subject—it’s no Google Glass! It’s also an infrared camera, so it won’t yield a typical visible-light picture. Can the camera take pictures of people? I haven’t asked Livescribe about this, but I’m not concerned. There are a few things to keep in mind. Voting ballot template microsoft wordThe data is not encrypted, and I don’t know of a way to wipe it remotely (I believe “archiving” a notebook would remove that data from the pen, but then you couldn’t continue to write in that particular notebook). But it is also vulnerable. It is very convenient to have all of my notes digitally accessible. But be very clear that you are recording sound, and get permission to do so.I think this is the biggest vulnerability of the pen. The pen doesn’t record sound—it uses your phone/tablet’s microphone, which is likely better quality than a mic in a small pen could be—and you can place the phone near to the audio source, and not have the mic pick up the sounds of you and your hand dragging along a table. Anyone using this pen should be aware of wiretap laws in their jurisdiction, which often include any recording of sound made without express consent. It requires a tap on a control with the pen, as well as actions by the app user, so I don’t see a realistic risk of someone on the other side of the room hacking into my pen.
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