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Japanese Airlines Ban DS, PSP
Gamespot is reporting that Japanese Airlines such as Japan Airlines and ANA have banned the use of wifi-capable game devices, including the DS and PSP, over 'safety concerns'. From the article: "A law banning on gaming systems with wireless capabilities came into force on Monday, according to the Hollywood Reporter. Japan's transport ministry has concluded that the electromagnetic waves from the wireless networks can interfere with aircraft navigation systems, so it's no Nintendogs for passengers flying with Japanese airlines. The new law also bans wireless computer mice, and headphones that have not been provided by the airlines, although the use of electric razors, calculators, and cassette players is permitted, readers may be relieved to know."
You mean the headphones they hand out free? Not sure how you can fleece someone with a free product. I've been on 4 different airlines in the past year and the headphones were always free to use.
oogly boogly!
whilst I would like to see some research done into this I think that it seems like a fairly sensible policy if there is insufficient knowledge currently to be sure of the effect that it might have. If it saves even one life it seems to be worth the inconvenience (which is pretty minor anyway).
That idea can get pretty silly. For instance Peanut butter can kill people with severe allergies, ought we ban all peanut butter in public places? Bee stings can kill certian people, ought we ban bees? A CD could presumably kill someone in exactly the right circumstance ought we ban CD's? A Scarf could kill someone too (and have killed many children), it's only a small inconvenience to go without one so ought we ban scarves?
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2006/10/30
How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
the DS and PSP are obviously easier to ban because everyone knows what they look like and that they have wireless, but for most electronics, can you really tell just by taking a look at them whether or not they have wireless? For example, some mp3 players have wireless, some don't. Other than perhaps Zune(and who actually has one of those?) and the iPod touch(which could be an iPhone in airplane mode once it reaches Japan :P) I doubt very many flight attendants could tell you on the spot whether or not a given device is wireless or not. So if they cannot enforce the ban, why have it at all? You are just going to make people angry without adding any safety.
But this does make the environmentalist in me happy, maybe more people will take the train vs. a plane for domestic travel, and having lived in Europe, the US and Japan, I can say that the Japanese is by far the best. Though one thing I still cannot understand in both Europe and Japan is why are plane tickets more often than not cheaper than train tickets?
Monstar L
That entirely depends upon the pilot and the weather.
If this 'wireless' thing is such a big issue and the people see that there is no wire, they'll ask you to stop using it.
Now, we being the ingenious lil monkies we are, can easily take a single black wire and electric tape it to the inside of the headphone and then to the device. It doesn't have to be molded or connected in any way shape or form to something useful, just a nice thick attachable cable that stewardess can see and identify and pass on by.
Stewardess: Excuse me papa san, you can't use that headphone on the plane
Me: Why not?
S: It's a wireless headset, it can crash the plane, eat babies, and summon Godzilla.
Me: It's not wireless, it's got a cable hooked into it, see , can't be wireless when it's got a wire!
S: Ok, carry on, enjoy air tokyo
Wheel of Time: Book by Book and Sumview (summary review) Bigdady92 style: http://bigdady92.blogspot.com/
Yeah, you know what? Anyone that allergic ought to be wearing a fucking surgical mask. Hundreds of people - whether adults or children - should not have to change their eating habits for one person. Peanuts are not only tasty but they're nutritious as well. I'd certainly rather kids be enjoying some peanuts at lunch rather than some of the crap served by, and present in, public schools...
I believe there was a man who went by the name of Darwin who would have something to say about this.
disclaimer: I've been known to store numbers in my ass for which to dig out when quantities are required.
A lot of peanut allergies are really severe, and just the dust from someone a few seats over eating peanuts can cause a sometimes severe reaction.
Myth. Peanut allergies can be severe, but never that severe. If you were in a peanut processing facility, or the person a few seats over was smashing hundreds of peanuts into peanut butter, maybe. Just eating peanuts is going to produce an infinitesimally small amount of dust. The likelihood of inhaling even a single particle of dust in that scenario approaches zero, and is not far from the likelihood of inhaling a piece of peanut dust that was picked up on the wind from a chinese peanut factory and blown around the world and directly into your mouth. They are both statistically implausible. And even if it were to happen, a single piece of peanut dust is not enough, in any recorded case of peanut allergy, to cause even a noticeable reaction.
Enough peanut allergens can actually be transferred through saliva (kissing) to cause a mild reaction in the severely allergic but even that is very infrequent, and I can't find a single case of death as a result (No, the death of the Quebec girl had nothing to do with her peanut allergy, contrary to the media reports, it was a cigarette-induced asthma attack)
Random and weird software I've written.
Some people have peanut allergies so severe that even talking about peanuts is potentially fatal.
No. I just flew cross country (JFK/LAS) twice in the last four days. The speech says that anything with an internal transmitter must have that transmitter disabled but the devices themselves are allowed. In fact I was playing MarioKart on my DS Lite most of the way back from Vegas (and my boyfriend was playing Phoenix Wright on his).
Hey, if your kid is so allergic that my normal kid has to eat bologna sandwiches instead of PB&J, you can either pay to have your kid put in a bubble, pay to have your kid put in a private school, or pay to have my kid eat bologna. Your rights end where my nose begins, and this works both ways. I may have no right to knowingly make your kid sick, but you have no right to expect me to pick up the tab for it either.
Some people have peanut allergies so severe that even being on the same planet as a peanut is potentially fatal.
Some people have peanut allergies so severe that even talking in a language that has a word for peanut is potentially fatal.
Some people have peanut allergies so severe that even the existence of the idea of something that may be vaguely peanut-shaped is potentially fatal.
sigs are hazardous to your health
That's debatable. They are suspected of causing the crash of Crossair flight LX 498.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
That's a myth: Statistically there are usually some switched-on mobile phones on a plane, and those devices are anyway regulated for frequency bands other than the ones used by air traffic systems and the like.
:) and in the interest of the cell phone companies to preserve network stability.
The real reason is that when you are in the air, they will try and contact - at their maximum power because of the distances involved - the multiple cell network stations the plane passes as it flies at a high speed. This screws with the switching system.
So it's in the interest of the user to turn it off to preserve both battery power and their genetic material