Free Stuff! Verizon Service and Palm Pre Plus Giveaway

My Life List

Update: The Giveaway is closed, thank you all so much for reading and commenting. The winner announcement is over here.

Hello. Would you like a free Palm Pre Plus, and $300 worth of Verizon Wireless service? Yeah you would. Let’s discuss that further.

As you know, I’ve been partnering with Verizon this month to knock a few things off my Mighty List, and as part of the campaign, I’ve been using a Palm Pre Plus.

The idea was to see if the phone would be useful to me, and to find out whether Verizon would be better than my iPhone service provider. Of course, my iPhone service doesn’t work at my desk and garbles half my phone calls, so I’m a little angry about that. Angry in a “hurl my phone against the wall” kinda way. But I can be demanding when I’m paying through the nose for something that doesn’t work. We’ll discuss that more later.

For now, let’s talk about that giveaway. Verizon is offering a $600 Palm Pre Plus for free. It looks like this:

The winner will also get $300 of free service from Verizon, which looks like this:

Well, technically cellular service is invisible. It’s more something you sense in your soul when you don’t feel like hucking your phone out the window during a conference call. So in that way, Verizon is sort of like inner peace, but with less yoga involved.

I’m not required to review the Palm, and frankly I didn’t plan to, but a few of you said you were pondering new phone purchases and asked me what I thought. So here’s the stuff I liked:

Making calls. Primarily, I enjoy using my Palm as a telephone that will call people when I dial their numbers — people with whom I can have complete conversations until we mutually decide it is time to hang up. I carried both my iPhone and Palm with me while friends got used to my new number, and I can’t tell you how many times I called friends on the iPhone so they’d recognize my number, and then had to immediately call back on the Palm so they could hear what I was saying.

Dropping it in soup. So. Right after I activated my Palm, I kind of dropped it in soup. I was freaking out, thinking I’d have to admit I’m a terrible phone parent and ask for another phone. But then I just dried it off with my napkin and it kept on working. I did have to scrape some dried soup out of the charger port with a safety pin, but otherwise it didn’t even cough. Nice.

Taking photos. The phone takes killer photos, you guys. Here’s what a snapshot looks like straight out of the phone with no Photoshop intervention:

See what I mean? (Bryan took that, by the way. Thanks, B!)

Also, it has a flash! On the phone! Which means you can use it just like a regular point and shoot without having to lug around another gadget.

Making videos. You can record video on your phone. Do you hear me? We are living in the future, y’all:

Typing. I know not everyone agrees, but I like the tactile feedback of buttons when I’m typing. Some people find the buttons too small, but I didn’t have that problem. In fact, I actually used my phone to send email for the first time in my life because the email is so well integrated and it’s so easy to type.

Applying lipstick. Yeah. The phone has a compact on the back:


(Photo from the Palm Info Center, which has a detailed review if you’re looking for one.)

When I first saw it, I was irritated. Like, “Oh, I’m a girl! I want a girl phone that helps with my lipgloss.” Then I used that stupid mirror three times before I even activated the phone. My makeup has been flawless for the last month. Curse you, user testers and your uncanny insight into my demographically predictable needs!

Downsides? Because I use the camera and video constantly, I run the battery down pretty fast, which can be frustrating. So you might want some sort of battery backup if you’re not religious about charging your phone every night. Also, I tend to be an early adopter of mobile applications, and betas aren’t always available on the Palm. I realize that may not be a problem for… most of the world, but there it is.

All in all, this is a good phone on a great service. I actually think it’s a smart choice for bloggers because the camera and video are superior and it’s much easier to type, so you can do mobile updates easily.

The Giveaway

If you’d like a Palm Pre Plus for yourself, not to mention a lot of free service from Verizon Wireless, please leave a comment below promising that you will not use your new phone to text while driving, and that you will not drop it in soup within 24 hours of receipt.

Now for the fine print: You must be 18 or over to enter and live in the U.S. Multiple entries will be disqualified. Comments will be open until Wednesday morning March 31, 2009 at 11 a.m. PST. I’ll choose winners randomly using Random.org, and will announce later that day. Good luck! My fingers are crossed for you.

Published

1,047 thoughts on “Free Stuff! Verizon Service and Palm Pre Plus Giveaway”

  4. I would *love* a Palm Pre…particularly because, a) I’m already with Verizon, and b) My current phone has adopted decidely diva-like behavior, ignoring direct orders and guzzling energy like so much vodka tonic.
    I can also promise not to use it while driving because I still refuse to learn how to drive, and of course, I won’t drop it in soup…I’ll drop it in the bread, duh.

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  6. I would never text while driving, I don’t have a car. Also, I will not drop my phone in the soup. It might fall out of my pocket and into the toilet, BUT I HAVE NEVER DONE THAT and that’s not the issue at hand.

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  7. I won’t text while driving, biking, or treadmilling. And I will only drop my phone lovingly, delicately onto pillows made of down and golden fleece and my dog’s incessantly shedding fur.

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  9. I, Chava, do hereby solemnly swear not to text (or talk or check email or surf the web or check my lipstick) while driving. Furthermore, I promise not to drop the phone in soup until at least the twenty-fifth hour of ownership. (And seriously, I could really use a phone that does more than, you know, make phone calls.)

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  11. I already have a Palm Pre, and I live in Canada, so I totally don’t qualify for this contest but just wanted to say that I love love LOVE my Pre for all the reasons listed above. Fab little phone, and even though I resisted the smart-phone thing for a very long time, now I’m not sure how I survived without it. Love.

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  14. Well, I don’t even have a valid license anymore, so if I was texting while driving that would the least of the illegal activity happening. And I promise to wait at least 48 hours before dropping it into any soup. (How did you even manage that, is what I would like to know — I can’t clearly imagine a scenario where that could happen.)

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  15. I promise too! Also, I really miss the inner yogic peace of having Verizon service. And my *coughiphonecough* is breaking and doesn’t let me know when I get calls anymore, so a new phone would be seriously awesome.

    I once knew a girl who broke her phone by accidentally peeing on it as it stuck out of her pocket when she was, um, hovering.

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  17. Just the idea of a maybe winning a new phone has made my morning… even if I don’t win, might get one anyway : )

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  18. Does this promise thing have anything to do with the fact that you are seeing the Oprah show next week? I promise that I never have, nor will I ever, text and drive. I mean seriously? What is wrong with a country where kids die because adults need to update their Twitter? Everything.
    Soup accidents seem slightly inevitable.

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  20. I need a new phone because I’ve got the first generation iphone (I’m not even on 3g, how dare I???) and I am in desperate need of an upgrade so I can send my parents and in-laws photos and videos of my 4 day old daughter. Seriously, if you saw how cute she was, you’d fall over. I need to spread the cuteness around. Her cuteness might cause world peace because everyone would be so busy falling over that they wouldn’t be able to fight anymore. I just heard her sneeze from her bassinet and almost died from the cute overload. Also, no texting while driving (why risk an accident with my cute little girl in her cute little car seat?) and no to the soup thing (who has time to eat when they’ve got a 4 day old?) Please pick me! I will totally send you pictures of my kid!

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  22. I promise to stop texting while driving. And I’m never using my phone while eating – eating is FAR more important and requires my full attention.

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  24. I promise I will not text while driving. I can’t promise I won’t drop the phone in soup, but I’ll do my darndest to avoid it. Thanks, Maggie!

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  26. Great review. Already a Verizon customer and love the service, but my present phone is beginning to drain the battery in 12 hours! I promise not to txt and drive!! 🙂

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  28. Can I admit here that I actually use a flip phone? As in, its not smart at all? A new phone would be marvelous! And I’m certainly not coordinated enough to text and drive- Thanks, Maggie!

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  29. Totally not coordinate enough to text and drive, and I don’t even eat soup! I’m a prime candidate!

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  30. I promise not to text while driving and not to drop it in soup. No promises about chowder, chili or stew though.

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  31. I do solemnly swear that I will not use my beloved and desperately needed new phone to text while driving, and that I will not drop it in soup.

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  32. Would love to upgrade my phone! Oh yeah…and I promise not to text while driving or eating soup!

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  34. Ohhh please I need this! My current phone is all busted, complete with a blacked out touch screen. I’m so used to not texting that of course I promise not to do so while driving.

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  35. I want! I despise my BlackBerry, which freezes every time I try to make a call and doesn’t even function as a reliable alarm clock. I already refuse to text while driving, and will do my very best not to drop it in soup!

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  36. I don’t know how to text when I;m not driving, so that won’t be a problem and spring is here, which means it’s no longer soup season. I should be safe.

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  37. Oh, this is so very appealing. My contract with AT&T runs out this summer and this could be just the thing to switch me over to Verizon!

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  39. I love Verizon, but my phone is so old I’ve had strangers poke fun at it:( Oh and I promise not to text & drive:)

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  41. Dear Mightygirl and Verizon I swear that if I buy or receive this lovely Pom Pre, I will neither drop it in soup nor text while driving. On another note- your texting abilities will be completely eliminated within months of purchasing a pantech slidie-both-ways-and-then-stop-working-phone. I call it the broken bi-sexual. Please fix my gender-confused phone woes!

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  42. This phone looks great! I have never been able to afford anything beyond the “free phone” that comes w/ Verizon service so I would love to try this one.

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  43. I would do terrible, terrible things for that phone.
    If chosen, I promise to give it a good phone and to never leave it in my back pocket (this is how phones wind up swimming in the toilet).

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  46. oooh, I hope I win, I am in desperate need of a new phone, and my contract isnt up for MONTHS! I would never text and drive! My husband is a cop and I’ve seen accident scene pix of people who were texting and driving.

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  49. Maggie, I promise not to text while driving. I also promise to TRY VERY HARD not to drop it in soup in the first 24 hours. I’m a bad phone parent, too :(. BUT I have had my iPhone for almost 1.5 years and I’ve only needed it replaced 1 time! 1 time!

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