[dhosek]

On the gadget front, I really love the paperlike screen protector for the iPad. This combined with the Apple Pencil made a huge difference in the usability of my iPad for writing/drawing. I still prefer to write on paper, but it’s really great for things like my writing group where we generally meet over zoom & I can give the author a marked up manuscript (with multicolor notes).

I’m also opposed to getting too precious about writing tools. So many people have drawers full of fancy notebooks with something on the first few pages and the rest empty. Get something and use it. Don’t matter if it’s a dollar-store spiral notebook or a fancy Leuchturm 1917 notebook, just as long as you use it. Same with the writing utensil. Pencil? Ballpoint pen? Whatever. I find these days I prefer to write using a cheap mechanical pencil (the kind they sell in bags of 20 at the supermarket), but I’ll use whatever.

I used to be really precious about these things. I only used college-ruled 9½×6 150-page spiral bound notebooks and wrote in 0.4mm fine-point felt tip pen. Did all my first drafts by hand. It ended up being an excuse to not finish stuff. I do most of my first drafts typing now, because it lets me get s⸻ done (although I still take notes by hand because that helps me remember what I took notes on better).

I don’t buy the cursive thing, mostly because I write slower in cursive than in print (although I have a handful of ligatures and abbreviations I use to speed up some things).

[ksenzee]

The cursive thing is almost certainly because he's using fountain pens. Pencils and ballpoint pens lend themselves to printing more easily, because they require pressure to write, and when you let the pressure up between letters, the line stops. The first time I picked up a fountain pen and tried printing with it, I found all my letters were connecting whether I meant them to or not, and I suddenly understood why cursive exists. Everyone who's learned cursive in the ballpoint pen era has been unwittingly taught a performance optimization for a tool they're not using.

[kamranjon]

Wow I never knew this - what a useful bit of information. Makes me want to try a fountain pen, I do like writing in cursive but I often get hand cramps doing it for extended periods.

[mangamadaiyan]

This is likely because you're writing by moving your wrist, as opposed to "arm writing". Learning to use your arm muscles to move the pencil will slow your writing down initially, but will give you more control and reduce strain over the long run.

See, for example,

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrMvJfuADfNUx6s3PEFaraQP7...

[nyrikki]

From the OP:

> "I learned cursive as a child. Then I went for many years without using it much, and forgot some of it."

While fountain pens may be nicer for cursive, they were very late in the games only coming into the scene in the late 1800s, long after fashion had been set.

In the US we were taught either the Zaner-Bloser or the D'Nealian alphabet, and while most of the claims of cursive over manuscript are typically overblown and fall under scrutiny, with common use it may not be faster, but is easer for (the small sample of friends I have asked) to write while not looking at the paper. Not faster, but easier to write in strait lines without looking (in my experience).

Manuscript (now called printing) wasn't common when Zaner-Bloser printed the book "The arm movement method of rapid writing"[0] IIRC.

But for business writing (which both Zaner-Bloser and D'Nealian were targeting) it is not so much the fact that you aren't lifting the point, but that you are using your whole arm.

The scientific claims of Zaner-Bloser are almost certainly suspect, but before word-processors, taking notes while not watching your writing was a critical skill, or was in my experience.

That is a very different world that the scribes of old, or even Roman cursive, which would have only had quills, and which did not really connect letters.

If you look into secretary hand, italic hand, and court hand, a lot of it had to to with style and preferences, with the US Declaration of Independence being in Secretary Hand, which had been in fashion for official docs for centuries at that point. Shakespeare also wrote his plays Secretary Hand, while ladies of the era would have used 'Italian style' italics.

So unfortunately it seems there are many back explanations, the real history is clear as mud in the absence of direct evidence, or more correctly, claims like in Zaner-Bloser.

[0] https://archive.org/details/armmovementmetho00zane/page/n3/m...

[ksenzee]

To clarify my point, I am fairly sure the issue is not fountain pens requiring less pressure to write with than everything else, but rather ballpoint pens requiring more pressure than all earlier pen technology. I have not used a dip pen myself, but I can't imagine it would require pressure to write.

In other words, all of the writing tools in common use since ~1950 make it easy to separate your letters, but before the ballpoint pen became commonplace, every writer had had the experience of using a pen that makes connecting letters easier than separating them. That's the experience most of us today are missing.

[adrian_b]

Dip pens do not require more pressure than fountain pens.

However, most nibs for dip pens cause more friction on the paper, because they do not have the balls that are typically welded on the ends of the nibs for fountain pens, so writing with a dip pen usually feels scratchy.

So there is an extra force from friction, but it is lateral, not a vertical pressure.

Gel pens require less pressure than classic ballpoint pens. Classic rollerball pens with an absorptive reservoir usually require even less pressure. Liquid-ink rollerball pens together with fountain pens require the least pressure.

I agree that with a high-pressure writing tool like a ballpoint pen it feels more natural to write disconnected letters, while with a low pressure tool like a fountain pen it feels better to write with connected cursive letters, without raising the nip from the paper.

Despite this, while I was still in high school, I transitioned my handwriting from the cursive style that I was taught as a small child to printed-like letters, even if I was using a fountain pen and I have always preferred the writing tools that require the least pressure, so fountain pens and liquid-ink rollerball pens are at the top of my preferences, while ballpoint pens with viscous ink are at the bottom.

[ricardobayes]

Not a sarcastic response, instead, to double down on your point. If you show this to 99.9% of the world and require the spend of $50 for the screen protector on the $500 iPad to get the "paper feel", they will tell you might as well just get that Leuchtturm or Moleskin notebook.

[RandomWorker]

That’s what kept me from going iPad. At the price of a 1000 setup you can buy about 25 Moleskins with, 280 pages each, + pens. If you fill 10 pages a day, that’s two years of high quality paper. My rate is more like 3-4 pages a day. So, I’m just so far out. My sense is that an iPad would last 3-4 years then it needs a battery replacement.

[itsdavesanders]

Yes but you can’t watch Netflix on a Moleskin.

If all you’re doing is writing then it’s not worth it, but for me the iPad is a fantastic piece of kit that can consume media, create media, and of all types, writing to fully mastered music albums.

[bigyabai]

Most people I know that make music on an iPad only use it for specific plugins or MIDI apps. They bounce the stems out to WAV and then mix/master it in a full desktop DAW.

You'd go through a lot of unnecessary suffering trying to do a professional mixdown and master on iPad.

[dhosek]

A musician friend used to actually do recording with garageband on an iPad. I use mine for sheet music a lot and even sprang for the external foot pedal for page turns. There was one rehearsal where I didn’t have a chance to scan everything in advance and was playing from printed music for one song and I kept stepping on the pedal to turn the page and nothing happened.

I’ve not done it, but it seems it could be a good alternative to a laptop for digital synth stuff.

[yurimo]

Personally found newest paperlike to be a lot like glass still, you barely get that paper feel at all and I hated it. They tried to keep clarity of the screen near glass level, but that affects the feeling a lot. Eventually I did some research and found that Japanese screen protectors that give you a feel of Kent paper are excellent for writing, so I wholeheartedly recommend those. You can find best rated ones by looking at top rated ones on jp websites, I have bellemond one.

[annzabelle]

I think you're right. It's very easy in any hobby to make the gear side of the hobby be disproportionate to how much you actually do the hobby. Think someone who's spent $3k on camping gear and constantly researches gear, but rarely camps. On the other hand, if you do actually camp a lot, it is nice to have the lighter weight higher performance gear, up to a certain point. So, Stephenson, as someone who does actually write a massive amount, is right to be using high performance gear, but for someone just getting started, getting into fancy pens/paper is a distraction from actually writing.

[galangalalgol]

If you are writing a lot and have dysgraphia, a cheap fountain pen like pilot varsity ($2) or platinum preppy ($7) can help you fight the excessive pressure we tend to use leading to less hand cramping. Using tools that make you write more because it is more enjoyable is good, using tools that make you spend time thinking about tools is bad. I really liked those tiny comp pads cvs sold, but I haven't seen them in a while and I don't like the dollar store ones. I just grab random pads that aren't bigger than my phone so they sit nice in my pocket.

[killerstorm]

I used ballpoint pens in school but I don't like the process: my hand often feels too tense, and getting handwriting legible is a lot of effort. Once I switched to fountain pens I enjoy the process a lot more, and the result generally look better without much effort.

I'm sure many people are OK with ballpoint pens and might even prefer the feel.

Fountain pen (+ ink and paper) doesn't really cost more than a paperlike screen protector. So it can be entirely functional. But many people also enjoy it as a hobby, collecting pens and whatnot.

[carlmr]

> I find these days I prefer to write using a cheap mechanical pencil

I know this is contrary to your advice but mechanical pencil, get a Kuru Toga, it's a really nice improvement and not very expensive. It auto-rotates the pencil tip, so you don't have the sharp end at some point.

For permanent writing get a Uni ball gel writer, it's supremely smooth to write with. Also not hugely expensive.

They're both not the cheapest option, but an amazing writing experience without being the fancy kind of expensive.

[runtime_lens]

I think people send too much time optimizing the notebook instead of optimizing what goes into it. I've seen beautifully organized notebooks that were never opened again and messy scraps of paper that someone referred back to after years.

[b3orn]

There was a post about something similar here a few days ago, it called it a "dirt notebook" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48954149

[setopt]

Paperlike is indeed nice for handwriting, but it has drawbacks. The increased friction makes it uncomfortable to use your fingers to navigate the iPad for long, and since it makes the finger motion along the screen less smooth, it sometimes prevents the iPad from correctly interpreting drag-and-drop or multi-finger gestures in my experience. It also makes writing very noisy compared to the stock iPad, and also compared to paper, so if you have a shared office you might want to reconsider. I ended up removing it again from my iPad. But to be fair, this was on a $400 iPad ~5 years ago, so perhaps high-end iPads with newer Paperlike versions work better.

[BenFranklin100]

Across a decade, I’ve used a Paperlike on five different iPads ranging from the iPad Mini, standard iPad, iPad Pro, both Gen 1 and Gen 2 Apple Pencils plus other styluses and never once experienced the problems you suggest. I’m making this comment on an iPad wth aPaperlike protector in fact.

To the contrary, the noise levels when writing are dramatically lower and I simply cannot imagine anyone becoming fatigued because of a paperlike protector.

[setopt]

Interesting. I wonder what’s the difference in our usage, perhaps the amount of force we normally use when swiping and writing?

Regarding noise, one of the main reasons I stopped using it was because my partner complained about the «scratching» noises when we were home officing together during Covid lockdown, and I personally also found it loud. I didn’t get complaints on the iPad before getting the screen protector.

Regarding the friction, I personally found swiping uncomfortable over time, but I guess that might depend on a lot of factors, including force used when swiping and skin type (oily vs dry skin, skin thickness and sensitivity, etc.)?

[BenFranklin100]

I don’t know why the difference. But if noise is a problem I would suggest buying different nib types and experimenting with those. Amazon has a wide selection, including rubberized ones that will make writing on the iPad nearly silent.

[setopt]

Indeed, I did switch to a rubber-like PenTips nib after that, and it made the writing experience really silent. Unfortunately it also felt somehow clumsy to write with – worse than just plastic-on-glass writing. It’s hard to describe, but it somehow made the «turns» in my handwriting feel awkward, and despite sticking with it for months I couldn’t get used to it. There’s perhaps other brands out there that make better ones, haven’t looked around further.

In my case, I eventually went back to a mixture of laptop and paper for most tasks, and now just use the iPad for highlighting (Zotero), lecturing (using Notability on projector as a blackboard/whiteboard), and occasionally to make figures and slides. But I stopped using it for note taking or drafting.

[BenFranklin100]

Pro Tip: In addition to the Paperlike protector, one can buy a range of different nib types from Amazon and experiment to find a one that suits you best.

[cyh555]

Seriously, just do it with what you have and what you can, like cameras, the best pen/paper is the one you have with you

[teiferer]

> I really love the paperlike screen protector for the iPad

Let me purposely be a little provocative here, and I don't mean any disrespect:

This is missing the point. It's not just about using the hand for a writing motion. It's about the physical sensation of actual pen on actual paper. It's about turning pages, arranging them, organizing them. It's about the serialization and finality of the words you put down. The offline character that forces a different mental discipline and requires (and enables) focus. You get a lot out of leaving your electronic gadgets behind and that's why trying to emulate that on an iPad misses the point.