Those of you that are frustrated with the current state of the Swype keyboard beta should keep your eyes open for a new alternative that launches for Android 2.2 devices tomorrow. It’s called 8pen, and it presents a new take on text input that may or may not be faster than current revolutionary alternatives like Swype. The keyboard consists of a circle surrounded by four regions, which feature letters on each side of the region. Dragging the circle into a region selects it as a starting point, and travelling through other regions scrolls through the letters of your starting region for selection.


The idea here is that it is more comfortable than a typical QWERTY reproduction, but will it be faster or easier to use? I have a feeling it’s going to take some getting used to before anyone can answer those questions. Check it out: