It’s the dawning of a new age, folks. In-flight Wi-Fi is slowly rolling out across domestic airlines in the US and Delta is looking to capitalize on it by outfitting their entire domestic fleet of aircrafts with Aircell’s GoGo service.
American Airlines and Virgin America have been on-board for some time (though they have yet to launch the service) and this is pretty big news coming from an airline that’s been struggling lately. Having filed for bankruptcy on more than one occasion in recent years, Delta is positioning itself to get back on top of the domestic heap.
In April they announced a merger with Northwest Airlines that would make them the largest domestic carrier in the country and the addition of in-flight Wi-Fi makes them even more enticing for would be travelers.
The first half of 2009 will see 133 of Delta’s MD88/90 airplanes equipped with the service with another 200 Boeing 737, 757 and 767-300s to follow suit. Delta hopes to have more than 330 airplanes equipped to provide the Wi-Fi service by the end of 2009 making it the only major US airline to offer the service across its entire domestic fleet.
GoGo will cost Delta flyers $9.95 on flights of three hours or less, and $12.95 for flights that are longer than three hours.
that lady is fucking scary.
You got that right she’s dumber than dirt. “Russia sure is a big continent?” What a dumbass.
holy huge lips batman.
Bummer, since the thing I like most about being on a long plane ride is being unplugged — gives me time to do maintenance on the hard drive, sort through old email folders, etc. Now Mr. Airplane WiFi will be tapping me on the shoulder, tempting me to log in, the whole flight.
Didn’t most international carriers do away with internet access on board because of poor demand?
Smart and bold move.
I just read the Journal article and they pointed out that Delta didn’t waste time or money with trials.
They’ve got nothing invested.
This is excellent news. I remember attempting dialup from the Delta seat “phones” many years ago. It. Was. Painful.
But will they upgrade the scotch selection in first class?
Considering the ban of cell phone on planes, would voip be allowed?
I will happily pay this wi-fi fee and might even enjoy the flight.
I bet the usage will be popular with the business world, traveling flights before meetings and such.
http://blabtech.blogspot.com
@pete
VoIP calls will not be allowed.
This will hardly drive people to buy tickets vs. other airlines… it all comes down to ticket cost for most.
It wouldn’t affect my choice of airline, but I’d be glad to find Wi-fi on a flight. Plus, it’ll be standard in a couple of year’s time. I’m certain they’d lock down VOIP, else they’ll loose too much revenue on the in-flight calls.
Do they make money from in-flight calls? Maybe I don’t travel that much but if airlines are counting on those calls to save them from bankruptcy we are in for a very long bus ride.
I’ve heard ideas of having access to mail, and a few other websites but blocking access to high-bandwidth sites, such as YouTube, Hulu, etc. They could also cache some common websites in an on-board server and offer it without worrying about bandwidth.
VoIP is NOT allowed. Is this thing on?
Peter Ha,
VoIP is NOT allowed, yes but will you please elaborate a bit; What type of policy is this, from whom it stems and how it will be implemented? Port blocking?
Can I assume the same policy will block access for IM clients such as Yahoo! Mesenger and iChat?
Thank you!
@Burak - they will not allow VoIP but it has nothing to do with losing revenue from in-flight calls. Almost no one uses the “air phones” anymore (did they ever?) and most have been removed (not only on Delta, but all airlines). Revenue is minimal.
@John - Good point, but then what would be the reason - security? There’s also the possibility that they’d miss out on revenue from in-flight cell phone usage (if it ever happens). It might stay banned in the States, but Europe looks like they’ll allow cell phone calls in-flight.
@Peter Ha - sounds like you know more about it than us, can you explain the situation?
Straight from the horse’s mouth.
“For the comfort of all passengers, Airlines have requested that Aircell not allow the use of VoIP services on the Gogo System. Text IM will be allowed. Aircell is shaping their WiFi system to disable / render unusable the Voip components ( without disabling IM) of services such as Skype on the Gogo network. A passenger announcement before the Gogo service is turned on will inform passengers that VoIP is not allowed. Aircell believes that good will and human decency will prevail, when using Gogo.”