I'm a diligent note-taker; I jot down thoughts on the reMarkable 2 and use a physical notebook (from Leuchtturm1917) along with a Lamy Safari to journal. I like the convenience and ease-of-use of the reMarkable 2, and it is ideal to take notes while attending briefings and organizing my to-do lists.
In the last month, though, I've been using a new product: the Flowtica Scribe. It is a regular pen that has a built-in mic that lets records meetings and conversations, and connects to a mobile app to automatically transcribe those recordings and generate summaries. I have Teenage Engineering's TP–7 on hand and used that in the past, but the Flowtica Scribe pulls double duty on account of it being a standard pen you can take notes with. Flowtica is crowdsourcing the Scribe, and it is available on Kickstarter for $169, a $130 discount from its projected retail price of $299.
The Scribe has a barrel design that looks like any other pen, and it isn't all that heavy either. There are pogo pins at the back, and you get a button up top along with one on the side. Obviously, it isn't as smooth to write with as a fountain pen, nor is it as good as Uni-ball's Jetstream gel or Air rollerball products. That said, the Scribe is decent enough in its own right, and you get five refills included in the box.
It's easy to get started with the recording feature of the Scribe: just hold down the top button for two seconds. The tiny LED located next to the pogo pins flashes red to indicate that the device is recording, and once you're done, just press down the button again for two seconds.
You can press the button on the side to note key moments in a meeting — the feature is dubbed FlowMark — and it becomes a digital highlight. The built-in recorder is very good, and it had no problems picking up audio. It's designed to be used in meetings, so I turned to it while attending recent product briefings, and it did a good job highlighting individual speakers.
You'll need to use the Flowtica app to access stored data, and as of writing, it's available only on iOS. Flowtica notes that it is coming up with an Android app too, but it wasn't available in the testing window. My favorite feature of the Scribe is its ability to automatically transcribe audio to text; while there are plenty of tools that do this today, the sheer convenience is novel.
Transcribed text is available in the Flowtica app, and it analyzes the text to deliver AI-generated summaries as well. They're nifty to have, but not something I normally use — the utility of having transcribed text available just moments after recording is what sells the Scribe for me. You can also save your handwritten notes; just take an image and upload it to the app.
AI is everywhere these days, and while I'm still ambivalent about most of the utilities that are available, I routinely use transcribing features, and the Scribe does a great job in this regard. The fact that it's a physical product that I can use as a normal pen makes it all the better, and if you're interested in what the Scribe has to offer, you can get your hands on the AI-enabled pen for $169. There's just four days to go (as of writing), so if you like what you see, you'd best act now.
