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I still remember putting a spring inside and shooting something out of them at my minis. they are soo old and bring many memories. Mostly how easily they broke. This thing always somehow ended up disassembled on my desk much faster than all the others. It was disappointingly simple though. I liked to take apart these with elaborate click mechanisms
Why fix what's cheap and barely does its job?
The kind of grace I yearn for in my performance reviews.
Am I crazy or have BIC lighters gotten worse in the last 6 months. They feel lighter, don’t last as long, and seem to have flimsy construction in the metal guard and spark wheel.
not just you, I crushed a guard a week ago when I flicked it, and they have less fuel in them when they're new. It's... charming.
They feel lighter,
This is how a lighter should feel
See. This is where shit has gotten to.
People are now complaining about lighters being lighter.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
It is broke though. Thing is shit. Dries up the nib, smudges, spurts. All round bad design
And yet people still buy them.
It does what it needs to, albeit poorly, for a handful of cents per pen. Once you start viewing them as disposable instead of trying to keep them until they're out of ink, it makes more sense.
These are the pens put out where they're going to get lost or taken, pocketed by the general public. I'd say their biggest flaw is that they don't work on hard surfaces, so they suck for signing receipts on counters.
They were actually updated in mid 90s when they made the cap have a hole in it.
What was the idea behind the drastic change?
This pen was decades ahead of its time. Made as cheaply as possible, just functional enough, disposable, and replaceable is the new standard for US commodities.
They've made more than 10 of these per human on the planet.
honestly, kinda refreshing to see a business not changing their shit constantly just to change shit. it's not the nicest pen, but it works.
Honestly still one of my favourite pens, and they last so long. Don't mess with perfection.
Why mess with perfection?
A hole was added to the cap in 1991.
Wait, the hole in the cap is that recent?
it's been 74 years that guy can retire now
In this economy?
He had to have an operation 30 years ago and now is medically bankrupt and can't retire
What? No app connectivity?!
You joke, but I have a cheap composition style notebook that I bought because it had a durable plastic cover instead of the old fashioned cardboard covered notebook I usually carry around. Each page has a qr code in the corner and it wants me to download an app so I can scan my writing and upload it to The Cloud.
I mean, I'm sure that someone might find that useful, but the whole reason I write with pen on paper is so I'm not distracted by technology and don't have to worry about booting an app and having connectivity while constantly worried that my work may not be saved/disappear.
The plastic cover is nice, though.
Ah, the extremely shitty pen that scratches so bad you might as well carve your message into the paper. Lasts maybe 3 lines before it starts skipping but who cares. It exists to be as cheap as possible so your customer you don't respect can pocket it after initialing twice and signing something.
I hate bad cheap pens so much. I never would have gotten into fountain pens if there wasn't the counter example of how bad a writing experience can get.
American bics may be made in a different way because here in Spain they are so reliable they are a de facto standard for people taking an exam.
Same in Brazil. The closest competitor, Compactor, will either smudge everything or fail twice as much as Bics.
I think actual Bic-from-the-Bic-Company biros tend to be pretty good (especially the orange ones with black lids).
For a truly scratchy experience, you need a cheap, unbranded biro.
The guy on the line wants to stop the money printer? No, no no... you don't change the top selling pen of the century. We can introduce a lighter though. Guess we're doing fire now.
Still tastes great