Here are couple of customer service notes that we're now going to track closely at PalmPower:

1. Publish your phone number. Ours is on our credits page.
2. Answer your phone.
3. Answer your email.
4. Return phone calls.
5. Don't take money unless you can do items 1-4 above.

We've noticed that there are some PalmPilot software and hardware vendors that violate these guidelines. Be forewarned: we've started getting complaints and we're going to make a special point of telling readers in reviews if you sell a PalmPilot product and your phone number is unavailable.

I, too, am not without my own strangenesses. Here I am the glorious editor-in-chief of the leading (at least in terms of the number of readers) and certainly the coolest publication on the PalmPilot, and I'm sitting here in a nasty Bennigan's on a Saturday night writing my editorial using a Newton MessagePad 2000. Strange. Don't fret, though. I also have my PalmPilot with me (along with my cell phone, pager, dictating machine, and remote door opener for my Forester). I'm so wired it's silly.

And you also don't need to fret that I'm writing this editorial on a Saturday night, rather than painting the town red. First of all, I think applying red paint to the entire town is probably against the law, somehow. Second, I've actually got a date tomorrow night, and I need to get all my edits and the editorial done before then. Of course, the woman I'm dating is the same woman I broke up with in February. I know I broke up with her because I wrote it down. I know, because I checked. But for some reason, I'm going on a date with her tomorrow and we talk almost every night. Strange. But I'm a guy. I'm not supposed to understand how this stuff works. Very strange.

So, with access to virtually everything cool for the PalmPilot, why am I writing this on the MessagePad? Well, the primary reason is that the Newt has a bigger screen and a nice word processing program. I can actually get a full line of text and a complete article written on the device. It's a bummer that Apple foolishly discontinued it.

Of course, now that the Newton's been canned, my ever unfaithful eye is wandering. The Toshiba Libretto is looking particularly svelte these days. At under two pounds, with a color screen, and running a complete Windows environment, it's looking mighty sexy. Of course, after plopping down well over a grand for my Newton and its associated goodies, convincing my business partner to let me get the Toshiba will be a tough sell.

"Hey, David! I thought this was a PalmPilot magazine. When are you going to talk about the PalmPilot?"

Well, dear reader, I'm glad you asked. Right about now. Isn't it amazing how these things work out?

The Big News for July was that Jeff Hawkins and Donna Dubinsky resigned from 3Com/Palm Computing. This is pretty big. Jeff and Donna ran Palm Computing when it was a small, 28-person, independent company and Jeff is credited with designing the original Pilot device. He really is "the man" when it comes to this device. And now they've bailed. Most strange.