Airlines Plan To Filter, Censor In-Flight Internet Access

BlueMerle notes that the much-vaunted arrival of internet access in the friendly skies may come at the cost of heavy content filtering by the Airlines. Ars Technica's commentary is prompted by an Associated Press article which does its best to make checking your email seem sinister. "Seat 17D is yapping endlessly on an Internet phone call. Seat 16F is flaming Seat 16D with expletive-laden chats. Seat 16E is too busy surfing porn sites to care. Seat 17C just wants to sleep. Welcome to the promise of the Internet at 33,000 feet -- and the questions of etiquette, openness and free speech that airlines and service providers will have to grapple with as they bring Internet access to the skies in the coming months."

Comments

Is this really that big of a deal?

[Anonymous Coward]

I mean, really, you geeks can't go without porn for 3 or 4 whole hours?

Here's a thought: close Firefox, shut the lid on the laptop, and *gasp* actually talk to the girl sitting next to you. You just might find that you'll be enjoying the real thing, rather than rubbing one out to pictures of it.

Re:Is this really that big of a deal?

[creysoft]

Maybe the flights you always fly on Hooker Airlines are filled with hot, friendly chicks, but here's a list of the people I've sat next to on airline flights:

A fat man
Another fat man
A surprisingly fat man
An old woman who needed oxygen and smelled like cheese
Two fat men
A little brat (boy) who kept kicking the seat in front of him and throwing things across the aisle at his mother (on the other side of me) who in turn kept screaming at him for the whole flight
An exhausted mom and her toddler who banged on his musical sesame street toy and screamed the whole flight.

I would have given anything for porn!

Re:Is this really that big of a deal?

[Moraelin]

I mean, really, you geeks can't go without porn for 3 or 4 whole hours?

Oh please, sometimes I even go without it for a whole 8 hours or more. Damn that filtering proxy at work ;)

Here's a thought: close Firefox, shut the lid on the laptop, and *gasp* actually talk to the girl sitting next to you. You just might find that you'll be enjoying the real thing, rather than rubbing one out to pictures of it.

Right. On a plane.

I guess there's always the off chance that the fat guy on the right is really a beautiful woman in disguise. Or that the lady with the screaming baby behind me is really available and is carrying someone else's kid. Or maybe the fat, loud yakking couple in front of me aren't really married, and I could pick the woman up. If I didn't have any taste, that is. (And I'm not even talking about the "fat" part, as about what she's yakking loudly about.)

But ok, let's say that I pulled the proverbial jackpot, my guardian angel used the miracle quota for a small nation and a century, or the karma accountants in the Heavens decide to give me a sorta tax return for what my ancestors suffered during the black plague and a few wars. So I'm seated next to a woman who's gorgeous, smart, horny, available, etc, etc, etc.

On a plane.

Have you been on one of those lately? The seating for a start has been clearly designed for halflings, and anyone over 3 ft tall will have to fold in unnatural ways just to fit their legs in there. I've been occasionally wishing for a modified Folding@home client just to figure out how I'm supposed to fold in there. Doubly so if the guy in front decides to lean his seat back on top of you, and/or hasn't understood under which seat his bag should go.

Then we're both after the airport experience, which is designed to inconvenience you the most, so you'll know you're safe up there. And I don't mean just the coming one hour early and standing in the line for the security circus. That's just the ante. You know, the foreplay for the real shafting experience. Then you've had to put up with loud and chaotic crowds, had to find your terminal (presumably named so because by the time you're there, death doesn't look that bad an alternative) with clues that would make old adventure games look tame, had a jolly good wait because your flight is delayed, then got packed on the plane and waited another 40 minutes because some retard forgot to load the luggage too. (I swear to the elder gods, it actually happened.)

Right. Do you figure at this point either of you is in a jolly and relaxed mood, conducive to making friends and maybe a little flirt?

Well, if you are, I suggest you hurry up, because soon you might get your in-flight meal. Which isn't exactly candle-lit dinner material, to put it mildly. On the last flight I've been on, for example, they gave us some... chopped up weeds, with one thin slic of tomato and one thinner slice of Mozarella. It was slightly larger than a 2 Euro coin, btw. It was called "Insalata Caprese", apparently because "capra" in Italian means goat and you'd have to be one to actually enjoy it or get any nourishment out of it. (Hint: herbivores can extract protein from leaves and stalks by letting it ferment in their compartmented stomachs. Humans can't.)

Again, forget any ideas you might have about what Insalata Caprese is _normally_ supposed to mean. The picture on Wikipedia tends to suggest something completely different than the airline version of it. I'd say that they had gone for the minimal meeting the definition (technically it had sliced tomatoes and mozarella, because they had one slice of each), but even that would be false. I don't remember it having any oil, for example.

I don't know about you, but if you're put in a romantic mood by it, and find a woman to match... well, then may I suggest a romantic honeymoon in an authentic Spanish Inquisition dungeon, complete with top-of-the-line torture chamber? ;)

finally

[Martian_Kyo]

I can upload on you tube, the panic on the airplane as we crash. Or IM my closes friends

Martian_Kyo:Hi!
Friend:Hey, what's up?
Martian_Kyo: Well, me...but not for long ;)
Friend: Heheh What do you mean?
Martian_Kyo:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3Ar3A11G01n9+oD1e
Friend:?
Martian_Kyo has signed out

Re:OMG censorship!!!

[YrWrstNtmr]

We're cruising along at 30,000', having a 'teaching moment' about cloud formations and what all those little 'squares' are, when the asshat next to us decides that I must redirect my scholarly pursuits, and instead explain what is wrong with that mans butt.

No thanks.

Filtering Porn (oblig)

[ravenspear]

I'm sick of all this motherfucking fucking on this motherfucking plane!!!