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When I see these sorts of things I'm reminded of the type of people who like having guns [1] (or watches rated to 100m when they've never gone on a dive in their life). It's like they're hoping for a chance to use their gadgets. I've honestly never been in, nor expect to be in, a situation in which I'll need some tiny watch link screwdriver that's not going to give me any leverage while I simultaneously also don't have access to a real tool. I mean, what do you expect to happen at Disneyland? The ferris wheel gets stuck and you somehow fix it with your multitool?

I don't think my experience is atypical either. I have had to use tools in an emergency before (loose sense of the word emergency here... just a bike problem on a long ride), but in that cases I had my bike tools in a pouch on my bike, so I really don't understand the appeal of this sort of thing, other than just the novelty factor.

[1]: Guns are fun to shoot or hunt with, I'm not talking about that, I'm talking about the kind of person who has guns for "protection", of which I'm acquainted with a few.

6 comments

I used to carry a leatherman, I wore it on my belt and it was part of my everyday carry.

I understand that some people don't need stuff like this, but when you're out of the house for 12h in a day it's very handy to have tools maybe... idk, 0.0001% of the time.

it's in those moments that you need, either a screwdriver or.. a small piece of metal, or something to cut with... that you really appreciate having to lug a small tool around.

> I'm talking about the kind of person who has guns for "protection", of which I'm acquainted with a few.

I have a gun which is used for protection, namely from black bears which tend to frequent the spots where I go ATVing. They've also made their way into town a few times, so it's not that long of a shot.

It's also always worth remembering that the police are an average of 5-7 minutes away in the event of an emergency. What that means to you is different than what it means to someone else.

Also, to be fair,

Is it specifically this sort of useless tool that has no possibility of use because it's just the tip and no torquing handle, or is it multitools in general? I get the former. I've never understood micro-multitools. You'll break your knuckles before you ever get a screw undone without something to grip.

But I use my (proper) multitool very regularly. Not regularly enough to bother packing a toolbox in my car, but regularly enough to keep my multitool on my desk and put it in my pocket if I'm going out to anywhere other than "just the movies." I'm actually on my second multitool, front wearing out my previous (admittedly cheap) one.

This is my current tool: http://www.leatherman.com/29.html

The only tool I haven't used on it (and I've only had it since Christmas) is the detent pin punch. It's marketed towards shooters, but that detent pin punch is probably the only part of it that is specific to such a need, as it can be removed and replaced with a barrel brush. Whatever. It's the best-built multitool I've ever had. The screwdrivers are actually useful. The knife finally locks. The "barrel carbon scraper" is just a scraper, and far better than trying to use the knife to dig at things. The bottle opener doesn't tear through caps before it removes it. The hammer is kind of silly, but then again, if it weren't there, there were a couple of occasions that I would have just had to live with a problem rather than re-set a nail. The pliers are smooth and strong. The wire cutters are sharp and strong. The wire stripper actually works.

Yeah, it's not strictly necessary to own one of these things in my life, but it makes life more convenient. I don't really need my smartphone, two different laptops, and a desktop, either. But it is convenient and I can afford it over doing without.

I have a tiny swiss army knife on my keychain - the scissors/knife are used constantly. Opening boxed packages, envelopes, food, even basic grooming.

I agree with you that the screwdriver bit is terrible compared to a real screwdriver, and it's more useful as a tool to pry things apart where you'd worry about chipping the knife blade.

The big swiss army knives - I'd be hard pressed to justify carrying any of those around.

Or like all the "TSA-compliant" pocket multi-tools that have everything I could possibly need in a pocket knife except, well, a knife--which is probably the tool I'm most likely to have a use for.

Guns are used an estimated 2 million times a year by civilians to "protect" in the US. Here's only the latest incident I've come across, where a couple were saved from injury or intended death (as admitted by the perp) because they had a gun: https://www.youtube.com/watch?x-yt-cl=84359240&v=0UXe9seMabc...

It's a bit disturbing, crazed guy breaks through door and gets shot 3 times, not fatally. A situation predicable enough that they had a video camera running, although it got knocked over about when he fully entered the apartment and got shot the first time.

There are a very few people who apparently are "hoping to have a chance" to use their guns to shoot somebody else. We generally hear about them because of the word we have for them afterwords, normally: criminals. I'll let you judge for yourself how eager this guy was, he lets go of some of his verbal and emotional self-control once the assailant is on the floor in pain and not so much of a danger anymore.

ADDED: Ah, yeah, just renewed my CCW license, and asked the person about how many state licenses are outstanding in my county, Jasper of Missouri in the SW corner, includes ~90% of the city of Joplin. About 5,000, about double from 3 years ago, which means a solid 5% of the age eligible population. We've clearly indicated we have a desire to be able to use our guns to "protect" ourselves and our loved ones (8 hour class, $100 for initial license, $50 for every renewal); I kinda doubt that many of us are are "hoping to have a chance" to "protect" ourselves with our guns....

If I owned a pistol I would apply for a CCW simply to make it easier to legally transport. I probably wouldn't carry.

It would also be nice if you substantiated that 2 million figure, or at least clarified exactly what it means.

You might change your mind as you get older. One thing I noted in the required 8 hour class was the demographic leaned fairly older, e.g. 45 and up. If you assume 3/5ths of those licenses are held by them (including me), that's 7.5% of the county's population.

As for the figure, Google is your friend: https://www.google.com/search?q=2+million+gun+self+defense+u...

These figures come from surveys, and the delightful thing about them is that the gun-grabbers collected the first data set. It didn't ask about the number of times per year, so that one resulted in a figure of at least 1 million times per year.

No, "Google is your friend" is terrible. You pick a source that you think is of high quality and are willing to stand by, not 'every source that sort of mentions it'.

The top link from your search extrapolated from a self report survey of less than 5,000 people. This article questions how reliable the end figure is:

https://stat.duke.edu/~dalene/chance/chanceweb/103.myth0.pdf