Wi-Fi Coming on U.S. Domestic Flights

jvptoad writes "The NY Times is reporting that United Airlines has received approval to offer Wi-Fi Internet access on its planes. Although it will be over a year before the service is available, I wonder if this will impact the discussion on cell phone usage in planes (which seems to be centered around the annoyance of people talking loudly on the phone). Add a headset and Skype, and you don't need a cell phone to have loud, annoying phone conversations on an airplane."

Comments

Good and bad

[zzyzx]

I have to admit that I would probably use this quite a bit to check my email and play on the web on flights.

However, I'll miss the fact that there was a space where I couldn't do those things. There's so much pressure on people to be available all the time, that it was nice to have forced downtime.

Okay, I give up

[Anonymous Coward]

What is it with you people who get upset when people talk on a mobile phone? Do you also get annoyed at people talking face to face in your presence? Do all forms of conversation in which you are not involved annoy you, or is it just the ones using a form of technology?

Interference with nav system all of a sudden gone?

[thekaz]

For the longest time airlines were telling us not to use electronic gadgets, fearing "interference with the navigation system." Well, if they're OK with having bunch of passengers putting out 1 Watt each @ 2.4 GHz, how come they were objecting to the little blackberry (albeit at a different frequency) and other two way radio devices?

Re:Time for air travellers to learn what mute is

[JanneM]

Using headphones is of course just common courtesy.

That said: earplugs. Earplugs, earplugs earplugs.

Not because people perhaps sit on the phone, and not because people will sometimes talk to each other. Not even for the guy snoring loudly throughout the flight or for the two-year old who's screaming himself across the pacific ocean.

An airplane cabin is _noisy_. That constant whine/hum/hiss is the single most tiring noise I know of. True, you conciously tune it out after half an hour or so, but it's incredibly fatiguing. For a long time I didn't realize that a good deal of my jetlag, fatigue and inability to sleep on the plane was actually due to that incessant noise (that, and that I never drank enough liquids - nonalcoholic liquids).

Once I started using earplugs during the entire flight (you can hear the movie just fine through the plugs) and making a point of drinking water throughout, the difference was huge. I arrive reasonably refreshed, not bleary-eyed and disoriented. The day-night cycle is still screwed up, of course, but the impact is much less.