Free MacBook Air -- if I become the number one user on Twitter

OK, I'm tired of getting my butt kicked by Robert Scoble and this Barack Obama guy on Twitter. Right now I'm the number five user (really #2 because the other three are software/Barack), so I'm going to buy my way to the top.

If (when?) I become the number one user on Twitter I will give my extra MacBook Air to one of the random folks who are following me. How we give it away will be determined in some fair way (i.e. random person obviously, but they have to be following at the time of the giveaway and they might have to respond to my tweet of them winning in a certain amount of time... like one hour).

Mar 15th 2008 6:10PM
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1. Hi Jason,

I like the idea, but I have a couple of questions:

1) Would you ship it outside the US?

2) If so, responding within one hour might be hard if the winner is asleep! :-)

Just asking for clarification.

Posted at 6:53PM on Mar 15th 2008 by Jonathan

2. Alright, I'm sold. I've added you to the list of people I follow. I enjoy the blog and Mahalo, so why not.

Posted at 7:06PM on Mar 15th 2008 by VaBeachKevin

3. I too can be bought! I hope you ship to Canada.

Posted at 7:28PM on Mar 15th 2008 by Martha Mihaly

4. Jason, in fact you are #6. TwitterHolic figures are wrong :-(

See here : http://twitdir.com/index.php?top=topfollowed&auto_update=on&search=

Posted at 7:58PM on Mar 15th 2008 by Laurent Pantanacce

5. Great idea Jason! Hope i will be the lucky one. Should i do something like this to encourage my (Pune property buyers) to follow me on Twitter? I should! Thanks!

Posted at 8:12PM on Mar 15th 2008 by ravi karandeekar

6. Give it to Doc :-)

Posted at 8:30PM on Mar 15th 2008 by PXLated

7. Jason - to better encourage people to join your list, you should only give the MacBook Air to people who join after the contest starts. That increases the odds of their winning, and further "incentivizing" them to follow.

Of course your long time followers may feel a little cheated, so you may want to buy one to raffle off to them!

I just joined up - I thought I had added you a long time ago, but I guess not. Guess I'm qualified. I could really put that little machine to good use!

Posted at 9:45PM on Mar 15th 2008 by ~bc

8. I liked your idea from before: http://www.calacanis.com/2008/01/18/free-apple-air-laptops/ back in January. Also, you mentioned in a recent podcast that your were thinking of a commercial contest... The random thing is great; however, I liked your idea of someone earning it like you mentioned in your Qik (i.e. your corvette)

Posted at 10:06PM on Mar 15th 2008 by Larry M

9. Ok, I will follow you not becasue of the Mac, but because, I like your picture.

Posted at 10:24PM on Mar 15th 2008 by Katybeth

10. Jason. I love reading your blog and I'm a fan of yours but I see an issue.

You spend SO much time and energy bashing the SEO guys who spam/buy their way to the top of search results on Google/Yahoo/MSN and even your own Mahalo. Which I'm on your side

And now you come out and say that you want to "buy" your way to the top of twitter. And a few weeks ago you wanted to give away a car to whoever can get one million searches on Mahalo.

??

Posted at 11:40PM on Mar 15th 2008 by D

11. Cuz being #1 on twitter matters

Posted at 11:57PM on Mar 15th 2008 by David Schultz

12. No thanks, the Macbook Air is not the world's thinnest notebook: http://lowtechtimes.com/2008/02/19/macbook-air-is-not-the-worlds-thinnest-notebook/

Posted at 12:50AM on Mar 16th 2008 by S.P. Gass

13. Best practice: Put a call to action, a link to your twitter account in the post http://twitter.com/JasonCalacanis
Yes, I know you have a twitter widget on the side bar, but that is not enough.

Posted at 1:47AM on Mar 16th 2008 by Raanan Avidor

14. ok

Posted at 5:53AM on Mar 16th 2008 by spyros1000

15. Ive been following you for ages follow me back and ill be happy twitter username johnspencer but i hope you get pm top of Scoble he needs a bit of competition cheers JS

Posted at 5:53AM on Mar 16th 2008 by John Spencer

16. I'm in buddy, I hope you can ship to Puerto Rico, btw will we ever see Mahalo Daily on Hulu.com, like CNET and ONN. Anyhow follow me @ http://www.twitter.com/Rmediavilla

Posted at 7:56AM on Mar 16th 2008 by Rafy Mediavilla

17. an hour seems unfair, if you’re in some antipode timezone …

Posted at 8:06AM on Mar 16th 2008 by kosmar

18. I'm in!

But, I agree, some other alert method needs to exist.

Posted at 9:33AM on Mar 16th 2008 by Gary LaPointe

19. We need more contests via Twitter. I've really been thinking about this since yesterday.

When you follow thousands of people you've got to miss a lot, even if you are very active.

Maybe the rule isn't that they need to reply quickly, maybe it's that they need to have sent a tweet (with real content) within 24 hours (or within 24 hours of when you've finally drawn for the prize.

When I'm out of the country, I'm pretty happy when I can find a place with non-dialup more than once a day. And after a few days of nothing, I'm pretty happy with a cafe that SHARES dial-up. I might tweet an update there, but I'm certainly not going to read through the archives...

Posted at 10:11AM on Mar 16th 2008 by Gary LaPointe

20. Hahahha You roll man!

Keep the prize, just follow my back

Deal?

twitter.com/dealsend

Posted at 10:52AM on Mar 16th 2008 by dealsend

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