I do guest post on other travel blogs, and I am working on a few different ebooks. 🙂

I’m so glad it was helpful! I went with the Android phone over iPhone based on the information here & am VERY happy I did that over iPhone. But everyone has their own need/pref. 🙂

I got a new touch screen non-smart phone last year but the touch screen isn’t that great and it is mostly just a fancy looking phone considering that the internet never worked and was a very dumbed down version of what I would see on my laptop.

Like I mentioned on Twitter, I like the BBM feature but then again since iPhone has so many great travel apps plus What’s app… it always seemed like it would be a bit better for what I was looking for. I don’t want to buy a phone solely based on using it for email and blogging but then again, what’s the point of getting a smart phone if it doesn’t help me out in those areas. I got a lot of responses for the iPad and although I see the appeal of that, it’s just one more thing for me to carry around and since I’m not a ‘professional’ blogger just yet I don’t need something that serious.

One thing that I noticed a couple of times is the mention of the iPod Touch for the blogging/travel part and a normal unlocked phone for calls and texts locally. That is definitely something I will consider.

I am currently in Italy and will be spending the summer in the USA before moving onto Australia for probably at least one year and who knows from there. Basically the more versatile and useful it is across the world the better. I don’t necessarily want to write blog posts on it seeing as I’ll almost always have my laptop. It will definitely be handy though to tweet and answer emails from that so that I can keep up with the promotions and social media/communication part of the biz.

Thanks everyone for the insights (for me and Talon 😉 ). I’ll definitely be coming to you guys when it comes down to crunch time!

I can vouch for Bubba’s Insane Geek Talk group. It isn’t a sales or affiliate thing. Just a bunch of gadget geeks. 🙂

Aaron, that’s so true! Just be sure the phone is quadband, or at least has the bands that work in the countries you visit, and the SIM will work. My dad gave me an older, but mint Samsung phone, that would’ve been perfect for calls and texts, but it was dual band – and not supported by the companies here, so it didn’t work.. I use http://www.gsmarena.com to look up the specs on the phone I want, then go to http://www.mobileworldlive.com/maps/ to see which frequencies are used in any country. Ciao!

Good stuff, Shannon! To give you an example, we have SIMs here in Thailand that have a specific price plan (called promotions here), with a good voice, sms, and data rates, depending on whom you contact (in or out of network) and when. I’ve added 200THB to my SIM in early January, and still have 100 left! 200Thai Bahts = $6.67! It’s prepaid plan, but incoming calls and texts are free, and I only used data sparingly to check FB and Twitter when I’m not at within wifi range.. Yup, life is good (and cheap) in Thailand… but no real 3G coverage yet, but Edge seems quick enough for most web apps on the phone…

Thanks, gents! It was fun talking tech!!! Everyone, feel free to join our FB group, “Insane Geek Talk”. Don’t worry, this isn’t spam, I’m not selling anything… just created a venue so we can talk freely about gadgets. 😉