Not the best I have ever had

My wife and I both bought 2 LG Venus phones from Verizon Wireless in January of 2008. Our 2 year contract was up and it was time to redeem our new every 2 reward. After searching Verizon's stock of phones, we were not sure which phone we wanted. We were amazed at the prices of the phones. This was our first phone purchase in 2 years and it seemed like the prices of phones at Verizon had skyrocketed. So, after much looking, we came to the conclusion that we wanted the LG Venus. The Venus is a nice looking phone. It is one of two phones that Verizon offers that has a touch screen similar to the iphone. The Venus has a sliding feature that if you want to make a phone call, you slide the body of the phone up to expose the numbers. The Venus is relatively easy to use. One concern that we have is that the screen may get scratched. Also, I wish that the Venus had an option to use the touchscreen to dial individual numbers. If your contact is not saved on the Venus, you have to slide the phone open and dial using the numbers. The phone has to be open whole time that you talk or else you will hang up on the call. We have both experienced a lot of echos while talking on our phones. I am not sure why it does this, but I have heard similar comments from other people with the same phone. The battery life of the phone is pretty good. If you do not use it for the music capabilities, you should be good with the battery. Normally we use ours for moderate talking and texting and we only have to charge about every other day. Overall the Venus is a decent phone.