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BYOK – Bring Your Own Keyboard
31–40 of 70 posts
Re: BYOK – Bring Your Own Keyboard
#32The question is how gimped the device is going to be if you don't want to lease their software monthly? There is a special place in hell for people who make hardware that runs static software, but still withhold ownership just so they can indefinitely bilk money from you.
> so they can indefinitely bilk money from you
Or just stop supporting altogether, a la Spotify Car Thing.
Re: BYOK – Bring Your Own Keyboard
#33There's a guy I see at my local coffee shop who uses a word processor. Based on what I found on eBay, I think it might be an AlphaSmart. If so, it would have run him about $75. I thought about getting a similar device, as I also write a lot, but settled on a $90 used laptop instead.
Not seeing the case for spending $175 and only getting half a word processor. If portability was the goal, an external keyboard goes against that. If the goal was better ergonomics, the screen wouldn't be the size and shape of a table tent. So... why?
Re: BYOK – Bring Your Own Keyboard
#34There are a bunch of distraction-free writing devices, from the BYOK to the Freewrite. They range for $100 - $500.
List here: https://kadavy.net/distraction-free-writing-devices/
To me, YAGNI.
Let me suggest two cheaper alternatives (battletested by me):
1. Fountain pen and a nice notebook with nice paper (Mnemosyne, or Rhodia)
2. A foldable Bluetooth butterfly keyboard ($43 on Amazon) paired to an old tablet (I have an old iPad Air 2) with Wifi turned off and no apps except a writing app. Google Docs works in offline mode! (this is what I use in cafes when I’m traveling). I recommend a Samsers keyboard. This is what I have:
I love good typography and I just can’t with these distraction free devices. The iPad Air 2 has a retina screen that displays beautiful typography.
Forget e-ink devices — they might sound like a good idea at first, but their refresh rate is slow enough to be annoying.
If you don’t need portability, an old DOS PC running Wordstar or WordPerfect is also distraction free. I used to write long articles for my school newsletter using nothing but Wordstar.
Re: BYOK – Bring Your Own Keyboard
#35There's a guy I see at my local coffee shop who uses a word processor. Based on what I found on eBay, I think it might be an AlphaSmart. If so, it would have run him about $75. I thought about getting a similar device, as I also write a lot, but settled on a $90 used laptop instead. Not seeing the case for spending $175 and only getting half a word processor. If portability was the goal, an external keyboard goes aga…
its a toy for techies. i see crap like this on youtube all the time. useless and impractical tech that people gobble up because were all children at heart and we like toys even if we're grown ups now. but it annoys me nonetheless because i always can't help but think "when would i ever use this...?"
Re: BYOK – Bring Your Own Keyboard
#36Honestly, this just looks like someone made a really basic writing app as a demo project on an LCD, and then their friend said "You could totally sell this" and then they ran with that.
This is a "solution" looking for a problem.
Re: BYOK – Bring Your Own Keyboard
#37I don’t understand the point of a distraction free writing device. I am constantly flipping out of what I’m writing to go look at codes, chat with ai, read papers or tutorials, and then back to what I am writing. I realise I may not be the target audience. I guess if I was writing fiction then I wouldn’t want a distraction.
Re: BYOK – Bring Your Own Keyboard
#38If you’re charging $200 you should really be able to see more than 15 lines of text at a time. I know the idea is to be distraction-free but it’s hard to justify over a basic writing app on the phone you already own, which includes a nicer screen.
Where do you see 15 lines? In the video they show the 3 text size modes. The smallest text size only shows 8 lines, even though the text on the screen claims it goes to 11: https://youtu.be/5hV8xfhdk7c?t=208 (3:28) I can't imagine 15 lines of text on a low resolution screen like that. I like the concept of the device, but I must not be the target audience at all. I can't imagine spending time writing on a low-resolut…
I was being generous by guessing based on the small font, and what I think would be the bare minimum for myself.
Re: BYOK – Bring Your Own Keyboard
#39There's a guy I see at my local coffee shop who uses a word processor. Based on what I found on eBay, I think it might be an AlphaSmart. If so, it would have run him about $75. I thought about getting a similar device, as I also write a lot, but settled on a $90 used laptop instead. Not seeing the case for spending $175 and only getting half a word processor. If portability was the goal, an external keyboard goes aga…
I once wrote a ~2,000 word draft,on an alpha-smart ($6 at a goodwill) and then couldn't get the transfer to computer function to work correctly, so I had to rewrite the whole thing because I wasn't gonna sit there and manually re-type three lines at a time from the grayscale LCD. The subsequent draft was actually better though, so for this reason I would recommend such a device. It's also a fun novelty thing. Really though, if you keep getting distracted from your writing, maybe consider if it's because you don't actually have anything to say?
Re: BYOK – Bring Your Own Keyboard
#40There are a bunch of distraction-free writing devices, from the BYOK to the Freewrite. They range for $100 - $500. List here: https://kadavy.net/distraction-free-writing-devices/ To me, YAGNI. Let me suggest two cheaper alternatives (battletested by me): 1. Fountain pen and a nice notebook with nice paper (Mnemosyne, or Rhodia) 2. A foldable Bluetooth butterfly keyboard ($43 on Amazon) paired to an old tablet (I have…
1. Fountain pen and a nice notebook with nice paper (Mnemosyne, or Rhodia)
Spending money is overrated. The pen at the back of your junk drawer from a hotel you don’t remember staying at will do just fine. There’s a notebook in there too that’s as good as new if you just rip out the first page.