Today, technology is one of the driving forces behind communication and social interaction, but it isn’t always the best medium for it. Phree wants to change that by allowing people to use any surface as paper, and have their marks show up in a digital format without having to use any other gadgets. Phree is a pseudo-stylus, a pen-like device that will let you write or draw on your fridge directly, on your table, chair, monitor, book, paper, lotion, wall or anything else that you find near you.
Phree was launched as a Kickstarter project about a week ago and it has already surpassed its funding goal of $100.000, gathering more than 2700 backers and $550.000 in a matter of days. The concept behind Phree revolves around people being free to doodle, draw or write on anything they want to, whenever and wherever they want to. The small device will connect to your smartphone or tablet and will feed back the information that you create with it so that it can be saved and preserved in a digital format, without you even unlocking your device.
Technically, Phree is a mobile input device, but it can be used in multiple ways, besides drawing. It works similarly to a smart watch, but adds the features that come with a Bluetooth headset or mouse. As such, Phree can be used as a mouse or even as headset through which you can take the calls coming in to your smartphone. Phree can transmit your handwriting and digitize it, which is remarkable, especially for those who find themselves loathing the way their handwriting looks when using a stylus.
Phree can be connected to a phone, a laptop, tablet, TV, PC or anything that can handle a Bluetooth connection, making it the all-in-one accessory that you might have been searching for all this time. It can integrate its data with various note-taking apps such as OneNote, Microsoft Office, Evernote, Viber and more. It can actually display the text messages that you receive on your phone on the small display that it has and it will let you reply in the easiest way possible. Just write down your reply on your hand, for example, and hit send on the display.
Phree can be wirelessly charged and the device will be able to go for one week on a single charge. It comes with a case that doubles as a stand on which you can place your smartphone and it comes with an open API. The SDK will be made available to developers soon, so we should see more apps joining in the Phree-train and supporting the input device.
The early bird rewards in the Phree Kickstarter are all gone, but if you’re interested, you can still back this project. Although a bit expensive, Phree sounds like a great tool for any type of tech enthusiast and if production goes according to plan, it might become the favorite accessory of many people. You can contribute $168 for One Phree pen, including international shipping, but you can choose between various reward tears, or donate $1 for further development. You can find all that information on the Phree Kickstarter page.
