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Comment by qwerty_asdf | Hacker News Reader

Most commodity ballpoint pens didn't have rubbery grips prior to the mid 1990's. I remember back-to-school shopping at the end of one summer, and most of the bags of pens were upgraded to have built-in grips. Prior to that, you'd buy triangular slip-on sleeves separately, if you wanted additional gripping traction.

It was a trend that started, and progressed like many other marketing arms races. One stand-out product emerged and out sold the normal offerings, due to novelty, and all other imitators jumped on the band wagon to cash in on that novelty.

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This seems to be an interestingly generational thing. As someone who learned to write prior to the 1990s, I may attest that the pen used to be controlled by balance and cautiously applying pressure. (Actually, you were punished in school, if you were caught holding the pen with grip.) This is also, why classic fountain pens, art pens and fine liners feature front pieces of a textureless, glossy material (because grip actually counteracted the control of a pen, if held that way).

[Edit] Somewhen in the early 2000s Wacom changed from thin and glossy to thick and rubbery pens for their tablets (i.e., from balance to grip). I'm still failing to become comfortable with those...

This shows the difference between writing with a fountain pen and writing with a ballpoint; the former requires and demands no vertical pressure, while the latter demands that the user push hard down on the paper. So penmanship in fountain pens focused on using the arm to write and using minimal vertical pressure.

I'm left-handed, and [writing] dyslexic. To be able to form any repeatable small pattern shapes with a pen (or pencil) such as letters or words, requires me to grip it with the force of an industrial press. Even then, I have to tense my hand, wrist and arm muscles just to write 'neatly'. As you can imagine, I don't ever write long essays.

Rubbery grips don't help me or hinder me, but I do tend to prefer them over hard plastic pens, not sure why.

I used to think 'Hey, we all use keyboards now, my failure to be able to write words wont be a problem anymore', but no... the world is now telling me 'tablets and pens are the future'. Not for me they are not; I have yet to find any handwriting recognition algorithm that can decipher my scrawl. In fact the lack of traction on the glass tablet screen makes my writing worse. :(

Several of my relatives have this sort of issue (minus being left handed). Some of them have seen some improvement by taking B vitamins and magnesium supplements, a thing that was tried due to information from a study. It isn't a cure, but it has made things more bearable.

>triangular slip-on sleeves separately

As someone who grew up in the 90's, I can almost guarantee you would get the crap beat out of them for walking into school with something like that.

Thank goodness they're integrated into the pen now!

Being bullied for this? Really?

It's a pecking order instinct. I'm sure even lobsters do it. The algorithm goes like this: find someone weaker than you, focus on any difference however small or imaginary, initiate pecking, preserve your place in the hierarchy.

So true. My nephew has a small mole on his nose. I never notice it, nobody in my immediate family notices it, but he gets bullied at school over it, to the point he wants it surgically removed. He’s six.

Worst thing is, the bullies don't care about it either. They just need an excuse. It's hard to believe how ruthless kids can be to each other. School was forever ago, but I still don't miss it.

Yeah. I'm sincerely glad that the majority of people here somehow have never lived in a world where that exists. But I (and many others) were not so fortunate.

I mean, where do people think all those pocket protector nerd jokes came from? Thin air? Or--dare I provoke more downvotes--was it because people were bullied for having them?

I'm not _endorsing_ bullying by simply acknowledging scenarios where it exists. I kind of miss the 90's even more now. Because it was acceptable to talk about, and sing about on the radio; the darker things of life like getting bullied, being a failure, being used in a relationship "I'm just a suck'er with no self-esteeem! ohh wayyy ohhhh", and so on.

Bullies don't typically need much of a reason. Having something that they don't is usually enough.

As someone who also grew up in the 90s, all the cool kids had these things.

Same here. Everyone was envious of the kids with nice writing implements...triangle grips included.

It's really weird to me that you've caught some downvotes for this benign and not innaccurate remark. I've upvoted you to compensate, but to no avail.

I love that even admitting that bullying exists, somehow makes people want to attack you.

As if I somehow endorsed it, or thought there was "logic" behind bullying, or that I wasn't the one on the _receiving_ end of the bullying.

We live in hilariously odd times. Better to pretend bad situations don't exist.

> I love that even admitting that bullying exists, somehow makes people want to attack you.

I love that a downvoting a comment which is construing an anecdotal case as the general case is considered getting attacked. Maybe you should just ask why people seem to disagree with your sentiment rather than jumping to conclusions?

I was a teenager throughout the 90's and was a bit of a bully from time to time, and I don't think bullying has changed much since then. If it wasn't a pen, it was the shoes, t-shirt, or the way someone pronounced a word.

Bullies are bullies, they will pick up on any thing they can and exploit it to belittle another person.

My parents once bought me Mighty Ducks shoes from Payless, without consulting me, when I was in around the 7th grade; suddenly everyone at my school was a bully.

Thank you for your candour, and likely repentance. If you have any insights from that time, that might help HN users' [maybe future] kids avoid your mistakes, I'd welcome your sharing

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