If you haven’t been digging for every morsel of Palm Pre info don’t worry – we’ve been digging for you. Palm executives have been answering questions via Facebook over the last couple months in 1-week increments. The latest Palm person to step to the podium is Stephanie Richardson.

Question: “WHEN WHEN WHEN???”
Answer: while you’ll see all “official” channels saying only “1st half of 2009″, Stephanie throws in a little comedic commentary by saying they are still on track for the 1H target and launching a product isn’t as easy as many think. She says it is a lot like “cat herding” and references the following commercial:

we are on target for our previous commitment of first half ‘09. And for all of you involved in product development or product launches out there, you know that it’s not as simple as having a bunch of these sitting in a back room somewhere waiting for the UPS guy to pick them up. Getting a product like this out takes a lot of work – it’s very much like the cat herding commercial I reference in the blog post. There are a million moving parts, and we want to ensure they all come together so when you guys get your hot little hands on a Pre, it’s what you’ve been waiting for. So rest assured that we are on track, and that we’ll let you know the exact availability date as soon as we possibly can.

Ha! Okay, okay… take you time, cat herding Palmies.

Question: Will I have to manually re-enter all my existing data (contacts, calendar, etc…) into my Palm Pre?
Answer:

Rest assured, we won’t leave you hanging. Definitely don’t want you to have to re-input everything! We (and our partners) will have a variety of options available for you depending on where your data currently resides and what kind of tools you want moving forward. Expect exact details on the whats and the hows as we get closer to availability.

The most entertaining part for me came from a commenter who suggested Palm employees watch a video titled “Everything’s Amazing, Nobody’s Happy” featuring Louis CK on Late Night with Conan O’Brien. Freaking hilarious… and true:

A flurry of questions have come in that are somewhat belittling, like a commenter who was angry the Palm Pre isn’t a world phone you can buy unlocked, like the Palm Tre Pro. Stephanie then acknowledged that she can’t answer all the questions on the board and contributed some nice PR fluff. Of course I can’t blame Palm for releasing a non-world phone… I’m sure there are reasons for doing what they’re doing and remember too – this is only the first WebOS device. Is leaving room to improve such a bad thing? Sheesh.

Also, the Q&A doesn’t end until 4/9 according to the first announcement, so we still might learn a little more. In addition, you can always post your own questions in hopes Stephanie answers. Just remember, don’t ask anything idiotic that you already know won’t get an answer… price, date, etc… that kind of think. Okay? Thanks. Hit the via link.

[Via Facebook]