I’m loving my new HTC Droid on Verizon right now, although I’m worried about my motivation for buying it. I finally decided to get it because Chris Brogran got one.
Now, I’m not the kind of guy who buys stuff because some celebrity says so. In fact, I will often go out of my way to not buy something because a celebrity did. Ashton Kutcher is schlepping some new camera? I won’t buy it. Peyton Manning has a new MasterCard commercial? He’s one of my favorite players, but I’ll stick with my own credit card.
I realize Chris is not actually a celebrity (he’s what we call a “cewebrity”). But after reading Chris’ book Trust Agents, especially his chapter on “One of Us,” I decided I could trust him. Chris uses a cell phone all the time. If he decided he couldn’t live with AT&T’s crappy network anymore, and that the Droid was a pretty good deal, then maybe it was time I joined the 21st century and got rid of my old flip phone. (It wasn’t that old.)
Basically, I was torn in three directions: do I get the Droid and stay with Verizon (I’ve been with them for 8 years)? Do I wait to see if the iPhone becomes available to Verizon in Q3 2010? Or do I leave Verizon and go to AT&T just to get an iPhone and have to deal with a network that most of my Indianapolis friends detest?
Once I saw that Chris Brogan — One of Us — had made the switch, I knew which one to get.
So my wife and I took advantage of Verizon’s Buy One Get One offer on the Droid ERIS (which I think should be called the ERIK, but they didn’t ask me), as well as our upgrade credits and rebates, and got two of them for $24. Not a bad deal.
I’m still learning how to use it, but I’m starting to see all the cool stuff the Droid can do: Twidroid for Twitter, Evernote, Google Latitude with turn-by-turn directions, and — God help me! — Foursquare. (I am seriously digging FourSquare. It makes me want to get out more.)
I’m still fiercely clinging to my celebrity independence, and refuse to be swayed by someone’s popularity when I know they’re nothing more than a shill-for-hire, pimping out their name and reputation to the highest bidder.
But I’m also wondering if Chris will autograph my Droid the next time I see him.
About Erik Deckers
Hey Bryan, thanks for the recommendation on Where. I got that one, and use it quite a bit. It was really useful on a recent road trip to my mom’s. I’ll have to look at PixelPipe and ActionComplete. May even try the TED app.
Eric – Glad you like your phone. Here’s the apps you need to get asap. Twitteride. Better Twitter. Locale. Control your phone based on location, time of day, etc. Dolphin browser – vastly improved browser. Handcent SMS. Better texting. Much better. Sorry you got addicted to foursquare.
.-= Mike Seidle´s last blog ..My new HTC Droid =-.
@Diane, I appreciate the vote of confidence. Thank you.
@Bryan, I didn’t even know about Where, so thanks for the heads up. I love apps that do a lot of things, not just a couple of things that every other app can do.
@Jon, you’re right that he did get a Motorola, but a Droid is mostly a Droid, especially when compared to an iPhone. It was his choice of a Droid over an iPhone that cemented it for me.
Nice, Erik! The Droid is on my wish list too. I have been debating between the iphone and Droid, but if you and Chris chose one, well, that is good enough for me! Merry Christmas!
Hey Erik,
Great write-up on your decision making process. I haven’t read Trust Agents yet, but it’s on my short list of books to read next…and hey 2 phones for $24 is pretty tough to beat.
I also got a new Droid recently (mine is the Motorola Droid instead of the ERIS, but all the apps are the same) and it’s definitely been awesome. I just wanted to recommend a couple apps in case you haven’t come across them yet.
Pageonce Personal Assitant
Keeps all your financial accounts in a really clean, easy to view app. I keep my credit card, checking account, and investments in here so I can check it on the go. Comes in handy if you’re thinking about making a purchase, but you want to make sure you’re not going too far over budget
Where
Great location based app that gives you full weather forecasts (which is what I mainly use it for), but tons of other stuff like gas prices, movie times, and even Tweets in your area. It complements Google Maps really well.
Feedr
If you read a lot of blogs, I love the interface of Feedr as a feed reader. I keep all the blogs that I want to regularly keep up with loaded in the app, and it updates automatically. This is a paid app ($.99 I think so not too bad) but it’s definitely one of my most used.
A couple others to think about that I’ve really liked are ActionComplete (GTD style to-do lists) PixelPipe (comes in handy if you’re posting content to multiple social sites) and TED (for enlightening 20 minute presentations that you can listen to during a commute)
Hope you enjoy the new phone!
Sorry, Erik, but I think Chris Brogan got the Motorola Droid: http://www.chrisbrogan.com/motorola-droid-my-take/.
Cheers,
j