You might remember how Penbook 1.0 was made: urgently. The starting gun fired in June 2019, at Apple’s developer conference; the finish line was in September, when the new version of iOS was released.

Summer is the perfect time for a crunch, because the extra daylight conserves midnight oil, which is getting scarce what with the Supply Chain. So this summer – after donning our rose-colored glasses and looking back fondly at 2019 – we’re sprinting again.

I’d like to show you what we’re making. It’s called Scanner Live for iPhone. It‘s a super-powered scanner app that knows how to read, and we’re giving it to you for free, forever.

Here’s a little video:

Scanner Live understands the text around you. It can scan and annotate documents like a regular scanner app, but the real magic is that it knows what to do with what it sees. It slurps up phone numbers from a stack of business cards, QR codes from a menu, and pictures and text from a textbook, and turns everything into tappable, easy-to-use snippets.

I’m showing this to you now because I’m asking for your help. Please pre-order Scanner Live. In exchange, we want to give you its full version for free.

Pre-ordering an app tells the Powers That Be that we have something worth seeing. It helps a small team like us punch above our weight. It doesn’t cost any money (now, or in the future) - it just registers you for an automatic (free) download on launch day.

Just go to https://apple.co/3B3Eaog on your iPhone or iPad, or tap this big button:

When we release the app in a few weeks, your device will automatically download it (still free!). Run it, and you’ll see a special lifetime upgrade for $0. It won’t be a typo – it’s our way of saying thanks for helping our launch. The lifetime upgrade has Family Sharing enabled, and it means you’ll never need to pay (subscription or otherwise) for Scanner Live.

I’m proud of this powerful little app, and it’s nice to have the chance to share it with you. We’re strangers, but I know at the very least we share an appreciation for apps that are a bit off the beaten path. In that spirit, Scanner Live is like Penbook: a modern and quirky take on a dusty old app idea. We really like it, and we hope you will, too.

Sincerely,

Team Penbook