nerdcereal.com

While waiting for the Yeah yeah yeahs to take the stage at the Fillmore last night, Verizon wireless had a screen projected on the side of the auditorium displaying text messages sent by people in the venue to a special address. “I love this band!!!!!!,” “I love their sound :),” “Hi mom!” and other inane, boring texts scrolled up the screen.

Rather pissed off by the blatant marketing scheme and curious to see if they did their QA, I decided to send the text, “Fuck Verizon,” to the number and see if it would make its way to the screen. The band came on, I forgot about the text, and never noticed if it showed or not.

This morning I got a text:

Congrats! You won for texting to the screen at the Fillmore, courtesy of Verizon Wireless. Contact Chris at 415-555-5555 to claim your prize!

I called Chris and he told me I won two tickets to any show of my choice at the Filmore. “You’re eating your words now,” he told me. But I wasn’t; I still have the same opinion of Verizon, despite the free tickets. Curious to see if he had the same opinion, I asked, “Did I win randomly or because of what I wrote?” It was random.

So I’m going to see Bebel Gilberto on September 9th courtesy of Verizon Wireless.