I was in the first round; heard about the program on December 9 and submitted an application. No feedback, no confirmation, no acknowledgement. A strange box arrived on December 17.
I also have an Acer AA1 running Linux, with Chrome as my preferred browser. I can assure those who think that running Chrome full screen is the same as Chrome OS. An increasing number of things on the Chrome store run on the Cr-48, but not on the Acer (and vice versa).
I like the keyboard and screen, not so much the trackpad (which is overly sensitive and twitchy). A surprising amount of work can be done offline, such as using Scratchpad for writing, or Read Later Fast to save web pages while online, then read them offline.
Bundling Verizon 3G was a brilliant stroke; I tried to minimize 3G usage until the end of the month, then started pounding on it to use up my 100mb before it evaporated. Although WiFi is becoming increasingly ubiquitous, the 3G is a godsend when you are in the boonies. With images turned off, 100mb goes surprisingly far for things like checking e-mail, or grabbing news stories for offline reading.
Despite the emphasis on cloud computing, I hope Google adds more support for local storage as this thing evolves.