A viral thread on Twitter has the pen fandom up in arms, with thousands arguing and generally voicing their opinions over which is the best type of pen β the one pen that you would use above all others, every day of your life, if necessary. Many people have a favorite brand, typically based on comfort, ease of use, or how satisfying it feels to run that inked tip over the paper when you are for some reason not on your phone or computer to communicate.
This latest distracting hullabaloo came from Chris Grosse, who happens to be a board member for the athletics department at Penn State University. Nice.
“OK, you can only write with ONE type of pen for the rest of your life, which one are you picking?” asked Gross, directing users not to base their choice on ink color.
It was a banner day for pen and office supply companies everywhere.
Grosse’s personal favorite is the Pilot G-2 07 β a very common choice, loved for its reliability, comfort grip, smooth slide, and entertaining clicky top button thing. He also enjoys the rather similar, but less commonly seem Sharpie S-Gel.
The Twitter user then kicked off a hearty debate by laying out seven of the most common types of pen and asking people to choose which one they would use forever, spurning every other pen known to humanity. A lot of people agreed with Grosse that the Pilot pen is superior to all, but there were plenty of other favorites declared, including many that were left off the list of option.
And to get it out of the way, yes, the multi-color mega pen was mentioned, and we all enjoyed it when we were kids, but let’s be real β that thing was broken in three days max.
Others were surprised at the omission of the BiC brand pens, whether they be the Clic Stic varieties or the capped Round Stic. A surprising number of people chose the capped pens, in fact, despite the constant risk of losing the caps and having the tips dry out or get ink on everything they touch. We have the technology to make the tips recede inside the structure of the pen, often with a highly satisfying click sound, so why would you choose a pen without it?
Not that we’re biased about pens. At least, not any more than everybody else is. And to those who posted their favorite ridiculously fancy fountain pens for writing calligraphy in the 18th century: Calm down, and watch out for yellow fever.
