In-flight Wi-Fi Coming To A Plane Near You - Except That You Are On The Ground

In-flight Wi-Fi rolling out everywhere, and fast : Christopher Null : Yahoo! Tech. It figures. Just when the economy tanks, and most of us are cutting back on travel to save money, the airlines decide that the time is right to begin the wholesale outfitting of airplanes with on-board WiFi. I really got bored on long flights; especially since the airlines seemed to create restrictions on using smart phones and computers. What has changed? It's okay for the airlines to pull broadband satellite signals to the planes, but not the ordinary folk? Oh, wait. They get to charge us $8 to $13 per flight (that's about $200 a day). Well, even if I start flying again, I would think a few times before adding another $13 to the flight cost just for an hour of Internet access. Actually, with my broadband card, and airport access, I looked forward to an hour or two of being out of touch. If that gets out, the airlines might start charging us for peace and quiet on the airplane.

Comments

[Peter Huang]

Like you, I don't really see the need to spring for on-board Wi-Fi. It's pretty easy to spend a couple of productive hours reading, working on a laptop, or (gasp) actually talking with your neighbor.