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Boeing Scraps In-flight Internet Access
Dreamwalkerofyore writes "According to the BBC, Boeing has recently announced that it has abandoned Connexion, its in-flight broadband service. Said Boeing CEO Jim McNerney: 'Regrettably, the market for this service has not materialized as had been expected. We believe this decision best balances the long-term interests of all parties with a stake in Connexion by Boeing.'"
Seeing as we won't be able to take our laptops or other gadgets on board aircraft for much longer.
Pricing seems to have been not unreasonable
p ricing&lang=en
http://www.connexionbyboeing.com/index.cfm?p=cbb.
Internet Flight
Get flat-rate access for your entire flight.
$26.95 for entire flight, including connecting flights within 24 hours of signing in.*
Internet Time
Get 1, 2, or 3 hours of access. Internet Time begins when you sign in and counts down whether you are signed in or not.
Access Price
1 hour $9.95
2 hours $14.95
3 hours $17.95
*Price shown in US dollars. No taxes or duties will be added. Prices are reduced during maintenance periods.
False. Cell phones DO work at high altitudes. High altitudes gives them good LOS to multiple cell towers.
What IS true and a scientifically proven fact is that cell phones at high altitudes create unusually high loads on the cellular network. See what I said earlier about good LOS to *multiple* towers? The end result is that instead of appearing as a user on one tower on a given frequency and nowhere else, it appears as a user or a strong interferer on many towers.
The end result is that while a cell network may have the capacity to server N users on the ground per cell, it can only support a total of around N users in the air for ALL cells within LOS of the aircraft. This is why the ban on airborne cell phones was originally an FCC rule, not an FAA one.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Cellphones don't work when you're over the middle of an ocean. Satellites, on the other hand, can. Plus, I suspect it's easier to use a satellite connection for live TV, than to try and and pipe it over a cellphone network.
Besides, if you're flying over multiple countries, you need to get on several different cellphone networks, which means having to sign contracts with multiple providers if you wanna connect the entire plane, or having to worry about huge roaming charges. Not to mention cellphones don't work everywhere over land either, and in some regions, networks might be incapable of handling anything besides voice traffic.
Connexion probably didn't take off (pun intended) because of the costs invovled. You could pay for a landline connection for a month with what you had to pay for an entire flight of Internet access
This is a sig. It is appended to the end of comments I post.
Who will I email for help when deadly snakes are released on my flight?
In Repressive Burma, it's not just your connection that dies. slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=314547&cid=20819199
The restrictions on flights have been lifted, and have for days. Laptops along with everything else are perfectly fine.
The only restriction is on drinks and liquids not purchased within the terminal.
Using a cell phone on a plane would be incredibly dangerous to your health.
If you were sitting near me on a plane spouting corporate buzzwords or telling your hard of hearing relatives that "...yes! We're on the plane...", for hours on end, and if I have to hear the latest (and always truly inane and über-irritating) ring tone over and over, then trust me, you would be in terrible terrible terrible danger...
The real reason? I couldn't use it very well even if I wanted to pay.
Given how US airlines pack you in like sardines, I can't open up my notebook larger than 60 degrees. That's not enough to see the display properly. The last thing I'm gonna do in this configuration is connect to the Internet.
Just bring some liquid fuel cell fuel...
Oh, wait..
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Cellphones, of course, don't work on flights as a general rule. They only work on flights THAT PASS OVER LOTS OF CELL PHONE CELLS. The Pacific, the Gobi, the Sahara, and Greenland are all good examples of places not rich in cell phone cells.
Of course, if by 'plane travel' you unconsciously mean 'plane travel within the continental United States', then sure, you can just use your cell phone.
Whence? Hence. Whither? Thither.
does that include dell laptops?
. o O ( TwO hEaDs ArE mOrE tHaN oNe... )
Actually, I've been doing that for over a decade.
I used to oversee nationial rollouts of systems, which meant I was on the road 95% of the time, often spending only a day or two in each site before moving on. I had enough to worry about without babysitting a suitcase which may or may not arrive on my flight, but was on the road long enough and in different enough climates every week that a roll-on wasn't sufficient.
Enter FedEx.
Every few weeks I'd pack up a load of freshly cleaned/laundered clothes and send them to my major destinations over the next month. Coats & thick socks to cold places, extra shirts & undershirts to hot ones, replacement underwear, etc. I'd put each cache in a cheap collapsable nylon duffel, then into the office for shipping to jobsites with strict instructions to hold for my arrival (there were usually a couple of other boxes full of gear)
Sure I had to pop by a store every so often, but at least I wasn't inconveniently buying a couple of new dress shirts at top dollar every week, and these were already laundered, pressed, etc. Plus when you're from out of town finding a store that sells decent dress shirts or whatever, getting to it, etc. is just another hassle one can do without. My concerns were the job, finding my way back to tonight's hotel, getting fed decently, and getting to the airport; not haberdashery.
Even if I'm paying I still often ship clothes ahead. It is a small expense compared to much of the trip, and frankly skipping the joy of dragging the suitcase to the airport, then the thrill of the lugguage carrousel at the other end (wheel... of... mangled... lugguage! Did mine arrive today or is it on it's way to Guam? Let's wait an hour surrounded by annoying people to find out!), makes it worth every penny. Check in to my hotel, have them send the box to my room, ahh, properly packed clothes, nothing crushed, all ready for wearing during my stay.
Seriously, career advice? Show up every day looking neat & fresh when everyone else is rumpled and worn. Especially true with suits, they can only be worn so many days in a row before getting nasty, no matter how often they're sent out for overnight abuse at outragous rates by the hotel dryclean service. Shipping costs are just a sound investment then.
I don't read ACs: If a post isn't worth so much as a nom de plume to its author then I wont bother either.