This LiveScribe Pulse SmartPen may look like a pen, but it is not just any ordinary pen.

• Jim Marggraff, CEO of LiveScribe, calls it "a new type of mobile computing platform" -- quoted from the video demo below.
• Wikipedia calls it "paper-based computing platform".
• PC World says "is part pen, part voice recorder, and part nothing you've ever seen before"
• Engadget says it's a "Pen That's a 10".
• It has also been known as the pen that talks back.³

This pen records while you write. Record what? It records the audio of the speaker who is talking to you while you take notes.

Sure you can use any other audio recording device. But when you want to find a particular section of the audio, you either have to play the whole thing or skip forwards and backwards hoping you catch it at the right place. With LiveScribe, the audio that it records is linked to the the writing that you wrote. That means that you can play back particular sections of audio by tapping particular sections of your notes. Of course, it has the tradition no fast forward and backward as well.

LiveScribe also records the writing and drawing that you wrote or drew. Just put the LiveScribe pen in its USB cable to your computer (PC or Mac) and you can transfer the notes to your computer screen. While it is in its USB cradle, it is charging up the pen as well.

Great for Students

A pen traditionally makes a good graduation gift. The is especially true, if the student is going to college and needs to take notes. I wish I had this kind of technology during my college days, But alas, technologies like this was not invented back then.

You can even share your notes online at the LiveScribe Community. Here is an example of calculus notes taken from a student in the front row of a 30-40-seat classroom. The instructor was about 15 feet away.

Great for Business Meetings

Of course the pen is not just good for college students. It is great for business meetings as well. The review of this customer said "The Livescribe Pulse has enhanced my career".

LiveScribe is called a computing platform because it takes writing as input and output results in the form of audio and display. It has a SDK (Software Development Kit) for developers to create new applications.

Linked here is a video demo of LiveScribe pen doing math.  In the below videos, you see a demo of the pen doing some language translation and playing a paper toy piano.

The pen picks up noise from its built in microphone that is right on the pen or from the ear-piece that you put in your ears. The pen can play back the audio through its built-in speakers that are right on the pen itself.

You have to write on special "dot paper" which you can purchase as a notebook, or you can even print your own dot paper what your are 600 DPI printer. It has an infrared camera at the tip that takes 72 pictures per second. Since you are writing on special dot paper, it can see the tiny dots and know where the pen is on the paper. That is how it is able to capture the path of the pen's movement. And that is how it is able to link the audio to the location of the pen tip.

Some model of pens can hold 2GB of memory. Although actual time may vary, 1 GB of memory amounts to about 100 hours of recording.

LiveScribe was founded by Jim Marggraff who had invented the LeapFrog FLY Pentop computer and creator of the LeapPad Learning System.¹ So LiveScribe uses similar technology as in the LeapFrog Tag Reading System where a child can touch a pen to certain areas of the children book and appropriate audio will be played.²

The LiveScribe pen has won numerous awards; some of which are ...

• 2009 MacWorld Expo Best of Show
• BusinessJournal Emerging Tech Winner
• Ubergizmo 2008 Uber 10 Award
• Popular Science Best of What's New 2008
• Engadget 2008 Switchies "A Pen That's a 10" award
• PopularMechanics 2008 Breakthrough Award