No Risk

My admired Ira Glass –I am a die-hard fan of the Chicago Public Media show This American Life— once wrote that he had had a nightmare involving Howard Stern. The whole issue was how much harder Stern’s life in the waves was if compared to his own, Ira Glass’s, conducting his more serious, apparently, program.

I am nowhere close to Ira Glass. I only write, and poorly for that matter, about fountain pens, and that is easy. I do not challenge any restrictive law; I do not deal with religious matters… So, all is fine. But that is not the case for many. Writing about politics, about religion, or even about Science when it is about Evolution might trigger some bitter reactions that might not be limited to just hate-mail.

This is not about declaring here and now my adhesion to this or that cause. This is just to acknowledge and honor the work of those who actively defend the right of free speech and who suffer the consequences. And I thank them—for the right of free speech is not to be taken for granted. Neither offline or online.

Pilot Belage, steel nib – Wagner ink 2008

Bruno Taut
Shinjuku, April 17th, 2013
etiquetas: metabitácora

Cool

This is the latest fountain pen marketed by Platinum in Japan. Its name is Platinum Cool, and it is a relatively inexpensive pen –JPY 3000, plus tax— to compete with the Pilot Prera (::1::, and ::2::) and Cocoon, and with the Sailor Lecoule.

The Platinum Cool, as shown on the online catalog of the company.

The Platinum Cool is nothing else than a demonstrator version of the model named Balance (ﾊﾞﾗﾝｽ, baransu, in Japanese). Therefore, there are two points available, F and M, for its stainless-steel nib. The pen comes in three different colors. And, needless to say, this is a cartridge-converter pen.

The Platinum Balance, as shown on the online catalog of the company.

The Platinum Cool, as displayed at a shop in Tokyo.

The F nib in a Platinum Cool.

Does this sound like advertisement (see, for instance, these links: ::1::, ::2::, ::3::)? Sometimes I think we, those who write some blog and who participate in pen fora, are naïve and ignorant advertisement tools in the hands of those big companies. Do they count on us for their marketing campaigns without us knowing it?

Pilot Murex – Pilot Blue

Bruno Taut
Yokohama, March 4th, 2013
etiquetas: Platinum, mercado, metabitácora

Popularidad

I wrote the following text at the begining of my activity writing these texts, and I published it in another page of this site. It was a way of expressing my initial puzzlement and a way to ask some questions aloud. Now, three years and thre hundred chronicles later, I have learned a thing or two, but the questions I posed remain relevant. That is why I am adding this text to the general section of these Pen Chronicles.

Escribí el siguiente texto al comienzo de mi actividad como autor de estos textos y lo publiqué en otra página de esta bitácora. Fue un modo de expresar mis sorpresas iniciales y de hacerme algunas preguntas en voz alta. Tras tres años y trescientas crónicas he llegado a algunas conclusiones, pero aquellas cuestiones son aun relevantes. Por esta razón las incorporo ahora a la sección general de estas Crónicas Estilográficas.


Jueves, 13 de mayo de 2010

Para Ningyo-chan.

Estas Crónicas llevan en marcha algo menos de un mes. Esta podría ser la décima entrada. Según a qué estadísticas prestemos atención, esta bitácora ha recibido más de mil visitas y apenas media docena ha dejado algún rastro.

¿Por qué escribimos estos textos? ¿Para quién? ¿Qué queremos decir? Tal vez pensé que sí tengo algo interesante que comunicar. O que es un modo de mantener el contacto con mis amigos estilófilos de aquí y allá, aunque tan sólo uno de ellos haya dejado un comentario en estas páginas.

A cambio, las estadísticas te muestran que hay gente a la que no conoces de nada que si no te lee, sí echa un vistazo. Sí, un uruguayo, alguien que vive en Aichi (Japón)… O en ciudades tan cercanas a mí como Ítaca (estado de Nueva York) o Glasgow. Y entonces te das cuenta de que es posible aumentar tu precaria popularidad cibernética.

Entrar en un foro y hacer una referencia a tu propia bitácora aumenta rápidamente el número de visitas. No actualizarla, lógicamente, lo hace caer en picado. Pero al mismo tiempo, una actualización demasiado rápida condena al olvido a muchas entradas anteriores.

He de suponer que esa pelea por ganar visitantes puede tener sentido para las bitácoras que generan beneficios económicos. Pero, ¿para los demás? ¿para aquellos que tan solo aspiramos a divertirnos con esto?

¿Para quién escribimos? ¿Para qué? Una vez encontramos las respuestas a esas preguntas todo es más sencillo, más relajado. Así que, si me disculpan, me retiro a meditar mis respuestas.

Mañana, más.

Sailor Profit 21 Junior – Sailor Brown

Bruno Taut
Inagi, 12 de mayo de 2010; Yokohama, 26 de febrero de 2013
labels: metabitácora

On Line Channels

Fellow stylophiles Dan and Eric of FPGeeks have reported the final release of a maki-e Pelikan pen based on the Souverän M1000 model. Well, Eric and Dan reported on the release in the US market as this pen had been in the Japanese market since October. But there are more differences other than the release date. The price in Japan is JPY 210000, tax included, whereas in the US it is about USD 1000 more—USD 3638 (MSRP).

The Japanese brochure of the Pelikan Sunlight in raden costume.

The maki-e Pelikan on display at a stationery shop in Kawasaki, Japan. The picture was taken on November 10th (2012).

It is very hard to understand these variations. It really looks like some –if not all— pen brands had not understood the idea of globalization or, even worse, they wanted a globalized world in just one direction—for them to sell their good anywhere without obstacles but not for the buyer to choose the most convenient conditions.

The medium nib is the only one available on this pen. 300 units were released worldwide. This unit is number 284.

On line mechanisms allow for a quick transmission of information away from the official channels as well as for electronic commerce. Is this so hard to understand?

Pilot Bamboo – Unknown blue ink

Bruno Taut
Madrid, November 30th, 2012
etiquetas: Japón, Estados Unidos, Mercado, Pelikan, metabitácora

Brick in the Wall

Consumerism is indeed a brick in the wall of the economic system now collapsing. A system both unfair and corrupted.

In a nutshell, that is the essence of my reluctance to consider myself as a collector. Now, the stakes are higher—people are evicted everyday, people in Greece and in Portugal and in Spain are being humiliated by being forced to give up on hardly gained rights…

Is there any room to speak about such superfluous tools as fountain pens? Are pens and stylophiles just bricks in the wall?

Sailor pocket pen, inlaid nib – Wagner red-black ink

Bruno Taut
June 11th, 2012
etiquetas: mercado, metabitácora

On Blogger

This blog is hosted by Google and uses the tools of Blogger.com. It was an easy decision when I started these texts. At first, you only want something easy and ready available, and eager to write as I was when starting, I did not do much search.

However, after two years in this activity, after having learned a couple of things, Blogger is indeed not up to the challenge. Google/Blogger insists in implementing cosmetic changes in the interface, but the actual problems –mostly in the editor and in the composition— have never been tackled nor solved.

Some complaints have also been raised on the problems to publish comments to these texts, and this shows a great lack of support for us, blog authors, and for its own service. Blogs are fed and fueled by comments, and these issues are very discouraging.

I wonder, therefore, if Google were really interested in keeping this service. I know now that Blogger is not a sensible option for anyone thinking of starting in this. Maybe blogs are not fashionable anymore and they do not attract enough money or attention… However, there are many other servers and options in the market.

(Danitrio 挽栄, Ban-ei – Sailor Jentle 土用, Doyô)

Bruno Taut
April 10th, 2012
[etiquetas: metabitácora]

Fora

Blogs and fora are the main channels that keep any cyber-community connected. Both allow, although in different degrees, the exchange of information. Blogs like this one have obvious authors and that exchange of information is mostly unidirectional—from the author to the readers; but there is some room, through comments, for some bidirectional exchange. But it is on fora where most of discussions and most information are shared.

Now, we wanted to believe that fora are free and open to accept any discussion, but it is actually not like that. After all, fora belong to some people who have their own legitimate interests, and sooner or later, forum administrators show them. The temptation of limiting —censoring is the unpleasant way to say it— the expression of ideas in order to protect those interests is hard to avoid. Fora become an extension of their business activities and there are certain limits not to be trespassed… But some of them can become ridiculous and question the role of the forum as an agora to learn.

On what grounds can an honest question on the safety of Noodler’s Baystate Blue be banned? Why does questioning the Japanese origin of Danitrio make the moderator –and Danitrio salesman— lock the thread? Why did asking what a fake is trigger bitter responses from a forum administrator?

All these forum policies and all those reactions of forum administrators reveal agendas and interests. And even if legitimate, they are annoying and misleading. Nobody asked us to participate on those fora, and we all agreed on abiding by some rules the forum organizer set in the beginning; and, by the same token, we could quit and leave any time. However, fora need participants and participants need places to discuss and learn.

The bottom line might be not to be misled by the apparent freedom of fora—they are not free.

(Pilot Super Ultra 500 – Athena Sepia)

Bruno Taut
February 1st, 2012
[labels: fora, Mercado, metabitácora]

Metablog

About what you wanted to learn, start teaching. Surely I can’t teach much, but this old academic sentence describes my intention when I started this blog. I wanted to share experiences and I wanted to learn about fountain pens, and I indeed succeeded—I shared and I learned.

But this blog has its own life. I started writing about Japanese pens out of simple physical proximity, and then I realized the limited information available on them. And suddenly these chronicles became specialized in mannenhitsu, 万年筆,—it was easier to say something original about Japanese Swan or SSS than about Sheaffer, for instance.

A Japanese Swan from the 1910s.

The blog’s life is also determined by those who visit and even read these texts, and the reactions they inspire. Not many comments I receive, and then I turned my eyes to secondary sources of information—number and origin of the hits. Some texts I never thought as truly interesting became very popular; and, reversely, some contributions about which I felt particularly happy barely received any attention. Among the first, the text on the new line of Platinum inks is a perfect example: I had written it about two weeks before I published it. Due to some personal constraints I could not work on these pages for some time and publishing that text was a quick way to say I was still active. Quick and efficient, as the number of hits increased sharply.

Although not an exotic pen, little information can be found online about the brand Athena.

Among the second, I am particularly happy about those texts on the Presidente and Joker pens. Nothing seemed to be known on their Japanese origin, and I think my friends and I made some modest but original contributions.

But such is life. At the end, we write mostly for ourselves, and any feedback is a nice surprise. Then, I will continue writing as long as I enjoy it.

With thanks to all those who showed up on these chronicles: Leigh, Kostas, Anele, Kinno, Readymade, Peninkcillin, Merino, pitquim, La Tortuga Vacumática, Julie, Kurazaybo, Nina, Bleubug, Kugel149, MANC... And to all those friends who shared their knowledge and pens with me.

(Waterman, lever filler, made in Canada – Sailor Hiroko’s Green)

Bruno Taut
January 22nd, 2012
[labels: metabitácora]

Bruno Taut in Madrid

Aedificare necesse est, uiuere non est necesse.
Bruno Taut.

Of course Bruno Taut is a nom de plume –no pun intended, though. I adopted it years ago when I started another blog on Japan. His name came in handy after visiting the Katsura Villa in Kyoto.


Westerners in Japan tend to feel a mixture of fascination and confusion about the new realm to which they are exposed. And many, from Lafcadio Hearn to Donald Richie to Ian Buruma, chose to write on Japan in an attempt to make sense of it. Bruno Taut’s story, though, was similar and unique at the same time. He fled the very hostile Germany of the early 1930s and chose Japan as his destination instead of traveling west —key word for the US— like most other artists at the time. During his time in Japan he wrote extensively on Japanese architecture and, especially, about the Katsura Imperial Villa. In actual terms, he discovered it for the Western World. Bruno Taut settled down in Takasaki –Gunma prefecture--, where he worked for the Takasaki Kogeisho Industrial Arts Center.

In 1936, he left Japan for his other love, Turkey, where he died in 1938.



These days (between April 24 and July 17, 2011), the Círculo de Bellas Artes in Madrid offers the possibility to revisit this architect. This exhibit on Bruno Taut, though, is not focused on any of his Oriental works but on his more theoretical and utopic work from the late 1910s—his book Alpine Architektur, an interesting exploration of modernity.

(Pilot 1998 Capless model with steel F nib – Montblanc Irish Green)

Bruno Taut
May 15th, 2011
[labels: metabitácora, Japón]

Reflexiones

Tengo pendiente una entrada sobre la nueva colección de tintas de la compañía Sailor. Está casi escrita, apenas faltan un par de detalles, pero su publicación me plantea ciertas dudas.

Es ésta una bitácora sobre una afición –el coleccionismo de plumas estilográficas— que está íntimamente relacionada con una serie de empresas que producen esos objetos de deseo. Por consiguiente, el aspecto publicitario de estos textos es inevitable.

Hablo aquí, y en foros de estos asuntos, de objetos cuya venta en nada nos beneficia salvo, tal vez, de forma muy indirecta. Y sin quererlo pasamos a formar parte de los mecanismos comerciales de esas empresas.

Es cierto que nuestra general falta de intereses económicos en esas empresas nos hace a aforados y autores de bitácoras más independientes. Nada, en principio, nos impide hablar mal de tal o cual producto, pero incluso un comentario negativo es también positivo: “¡que hablen de mí, aunque sea mal!”

Algunas de las tintas ya viejas de Sailor.

Publicaré mi texto sobre las tintas Sailor y miraré para otro lado. Hablaré de plumas que se fabrican hoy en día –ya lo hice— y mencionaré explícitamente al fabricante. Añadiré fotos hechas por mí y cerraré los ojos. Después de todo, nadie me obligó a iniciar esta andadura.

Pero no puedo evitar la sensación de que trabajo gratis para alguien que no siempre se lo merece. Por ejemplo, para Sailor en un momento en el que ha decidido subir el precio de sus tintas un 66% en Japón.

(Platinum Preppy 0.5 – Platinum Carbon Ink)

Bruno Taut
(Inagi, 23 de junio de 2010)
[labels: estilofilia, metabitácora, tinta, Sailor, mercado]