Will over at IntoMobile has some sad news for Palm, Sprint, and their investors: Some 40% of all Palm Pre smartphones sold to date - and they've all been sold with Sprint contracts - have been returned by unhappy owners. 40% is, like, almost half. Ouch.

Okay, it's not really Will's news - he reported on some analyst's estimate - but if this is true it's a big shot of buzzkill in the arm of Palm and Sprint's comeback. IntoMobile and said analyst - Kevin Dede - point to hardware defects as the main cause for returns, though Will also mentions a recent survey in which Pre owners confess they wish there was a way to enter text while using the Web browser in landscape mode. Like, y'know, a soft QWERTY board or something.

All of this Pre talk led me to a few of my own observations on the odd way in which said comeback has been staged thus far:

1. Palm launched the Pre and WebOS with a hugely media friendly press conference at CES in January
2. Palm then refused to let media and analysts handle Pre at any trade shows or events over the next six months
3. Palm and Sprint really didn't do very much advertising of Pre in the weeks leading up to and following its launch. Think about it - I saw a few full page ads in national newspapers, sure, but where were the TV spots? I saw a few Sprint ads with a Pre or two in them, but they were ads for "The Now Network," and not for Pre itself.
4. Now that Pre's been out for a few weeks, Palm's running a series of much maligned ads that promise abstractions like serenity while confusing viewers used to Apple's straightforward, "Want some shrimp? There's an app for that" approach. Sprint says the ads are reaching would-be customers in key demographics. The media - well, okay, the blogosphere - says otherwise:

"New Palm Pre TV Ad is Quiet. A Little too Quiet" - J Robitaille, PreCentral

"New Palm Pre TV ad doubles as sleeping aid" - W Park, IntoMobile

"This stoned-out-of-her-mind Canadian actress Tamara Hope talking about flow for 30 seconds makes this Palm Pre ad more like a tampon ad instead of a cellphone commercial." - J Chen, Gizmodo

I just ... I don't get it.  Frankly, I don't get most of Sprint's ads, anyway, but why in the world is Palm taking the wacky esoteric route? They have a killer product, a killer platform, and - dare I say it - an ex-Apple guy who seems to have instilled an Apple-esque control over buzz-making and media ops in his PR and marketing staffs. That's a good thing, by the way, even if as a blogger/journalist it ticks me off from time to time.

So why the near radio silence followed by a string of bizarro-land ads that seem aimed at the same people who actually care that Pre's industrial design was "inspired by a river stone." That's all of four people, if you're counting along at home. Palm should drop with the nonsense and unleash a fury of to the point, butt kicking ads that make salient points that consumer tech buying Americans can digest and remember.

Like what? Glad you asked:

• Palm Pre: A smartphone that lets you send picture messages. We're looking at you, iPhone.
• Palm Pre: Email, texting, Facebook and the Web. All at the same time. iPhone can't do that.
• Palm Pre: The smartest phone on the planet. And the prettiest and easiest to use, too.
• Palm Pre: You send messages with your phone, so don't you deserve a real keyboard? iPhone doesn't have one.
• Palm Pre: You want to find some shrimp? There's an app for that. It's called cell phone service that doesn't suck, AT&T.
• Palm Pre: The only phone in the world you can charge without wires. Seriously - isn't that cool?

I'm just gettin' warmed up. I'm not saying any of the above are brilliant, and I'm not saying that they're all inarguable. But at least people can understand the messages, and at least the messages are designed to make those people want the damn phone. And that's not even touching upon the fact that Palm's Pre ads and Sprint's Pre ads are so disparate that I can only guess that the two companies are not enjoying the warmest and fuzziest of relationships right about now.

Want more? Adrian at Gizmodo has a list of 23 software fixes/upgrades Palm should push out to Pre owners. Now. It's a good read.