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”

  2. I won’t text or drop it in soup. I actually am in the market for a new phone. It’s time to accept that cell phones aren’t going anywhere (they are here to stay) and upgrade from my cheap pay as you go phone. Which I have actually loved.

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  4. Can I still check for texts if I promise not to respond to them? As for the soup, it’s finally Spring in New Jersey, so soup season has ended.

    I am mighty jealous (in a good way) and inspired by your lists and sites, by the way. Thanks for all of them!

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  5. Maggie,

    I solemnly swear to use the Pre for only good. Specifically, I’ll download all kinds of drug references for my patients so I don’t have to search through a book in the middle of the night.

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  7. I promise I will not text while driving, drop it in soup within 24 hours of receipt, nor use it to take over the world. Not the whole world, anyway…

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  8. Dude, I would totally love this phone. Enough to not text while driving so I dont crash and break it. Plus, my lipgloss is usually smeared so I clearly need the mirror. Not to mention I am quite dainty around soup! Perfect match!

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  9. No driving and texting (how do people do that, anyway?), and the phone will stay in my purse during soup-eating. I promise. Oh, the mirrored back? BRILLIANT!

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  10. I would love a free phone … have been eyeing them for a while but sticking with my cheapo free-with-the-rebate phone. I will not text while driving. And I will just not eat soup for 24hrs after getting the phone, so that should solve that problem. Unless it is tortilla soup day at work … then … no promises. 🙂

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  11. Wow! That’s a fantastic photo for a phone. I’m actually looking at new phones, as our current service contract is up in April. So, with that said, I will not use the new phone to text while driving, and I will not drop it in soup within 24 hours of receipt.

    Can’t guarantee I won’t drop it in the bathtub, though.

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  13. I do want a new phone as mine is prone to not send important text messages such as “get infant motrin for the love of god” leading to near divorce not to mention hours of tears! (To clarify, the tears are mine; my son is just screaming while biting anything he can.)

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  15. man, I’ve been wanting this phone for a while, and hearing that it’s this good is even better. And I totally promise I won’t drop it in soup, or use it to text while driving. 🙂

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  16. I loathe the thought of anyone who texts while driving… Thanks for this amazing giveaway, Maggie!

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  17. You mean I can use a phone for actual phone calls? My iPhone service is so sporadic when it comes to calls.

    I promise not to text and drive. And I will keep my new phone away from the soup.

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  18. I solemnly swear to never text while driving (or surf the web or check facebook or mess around with the latest gossip apps) so I can live a long and happy life with a fancypants phone.

    I also swear to never dress the phone in jam trousers or hot liquid of any kind, most especially soup!

    Thanks for the fun Maggie 🙂

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  23. I have not, as yet, dropped any of my phones, into any liquid of any kind. My brother, who has dropped a couple in a lake and one in a toilet, has taught me good phone parenting skills. 🙂 I also promise to never text and drive, as I value my life far more than typing an “lol” reply. My “lols” can wait until I’m parked and the engine is off.

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  24. No texting will driving, got it. And I’m usually too focused on my food to futz with my phone at the same time, so I think we’ll be good on both scores. Awesome contest!

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  25. My coworkers would definitely stop laughing at me if I had a fancy-shmancy phone like that…it would be a definite upgrade from my “totally 2007” cellphone. TWD is a huge peeve of mine, as is dropping phones in soup I suppose. Promise I don’t/won’t do it.

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  28. i will not text and drive, and also, i am over eating soup now that the bad weather is gone….so two for two! 🙂

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  30. I don’t drive, but I sure do text a lot. And I do eat soup, but I usually need all hands on deck to do that… Also, as someone who’s looking to get into blogging, this looks like an awesome phone to have!

    -Laura

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  31. does this mean I could possibly get rid of my old flip phone that the kids have dubbed “the brickberry”?

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  33. I promise not to text while driving, nor will I text during any other activity that requires my full attention. By the way, I have been a Verizon customer since 2000 and love them madly. 🙂

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  34. I love my iPhone, I really do… but I also would like to try the other smart phones out there.

    I won’t use it to text/tweet/facebook while driving!

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  35. What is this “texting” thing you speak of? Is that some new thing these teenagers are doing nowadays? And doing this while driving???? Goodness gracious!

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  40. Oh, Mighty Girl & Universe so Divine… I promise not to text and drive… even though it seems much of my life is driving, I know the fabulous features of this product will keep me gloriously hands free.

    I also promise, NEVER to drop it in soup… cranberry juice, or in the toilet (because I NEVER talk on the phone while sitting on the porcelain throne like I hear others do), either within 24 or until I am ready for an upgrade in 4 years! I can feel that phone in my hands already!

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  43. so I don’t know if my accidental double post up there (numbers 2 and 3) count towards disqualification – I posted the comment, it didn’t show up, so I did it again and it showed up twice! sorry.

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  44. I will nurse the phone, if I have to, to prove my phone parenting skills. I will never text while driving, and I won’t even eat soup for at least three days after it arrives. Also, I hate Sprint! Please release me from the unpleasantness of Sprint.

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  45. i promise i won’t text while driving. but i would LOVE to throw away this stupid iphone (sob! i love it so much) and the stupid, stupid at&t service that doesn’t allow me to make calls from INSIDE MY OFFICE so that I have to walk outside to make client calls. I curse you at&t. verizon, make me your bitch.

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  46. I absolutely promise not to text and drive. And to love it and care for it and call it George.

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  48. I promise not to text while driving. I promise I will try not to drop it in soup. I’m a poor grad student, and I would love a phone that I can get email on!

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  50. I pinky promise to both not text while driving and not drop the phone in soup.

    Also: thank you for posting this review. Just when I was ready to go and pick up and Eris, you point out the niceness of buttons and the quality of your phone! (I do mean that. I’ve been avoiding looking at the Palm’s because I’m interested in the Android OS. But the camera makes it sooo tempting…)

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