Many of you, dear readers, will know that I am a big fan of the Livescribe Echo smartpen as a productivity tool. Back in September 2011 I wrote about how it replaced my MontBlanc for business writing. In October 2012 I wrote about how their new smartpen, the Livescribe Sky, was about to take handwriting mobile. I was excited. I was working on a productivity pointer post on the Livescribe Sky then this happened.

There I was, happily developing my blog post for you on how I use the Livescribe Sky and Evernote to further improve my meeting notes and other business notes and plans when, on 17th December the Guardian reported that a copyright infringement claim by BSkyB forced Livescribe to pull the pen off the UK market.

I’m still loving the pen and the way it wirelessly sends my written notes and recorded audio (usually from conferences and events – where I rarely take full written notes any more) to my secure Evernote account for use with my business systems.

This is obviously a blow to Livescribe in the UK. The pen continues to be available in the USA and elsewhere. Once the legalities of the matter are settled in the UK I will write about how I use the Livescribe Sky as part of my productivity platform.