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Random Thoughts on Air Travel and Tech
This past week I had a rather exhausting business trip where I had to fly from Seattle to New England give a presentation and then fly back. The problem was on Tuesday night there was a super bad wind and snowstorm on the Eastern Seaboard and my trip was plagued with delayed flights and an aborted landing. So like any good Internet blogger I took this as a chance to spend lots of time with my notebook and reflect on high-tech communications.
Here are some of my conclusions.
Wifi at Airports can suck my ass. We have done Wifi in airports all wrong in this country. There is no communication and shared plans between pay-for-play Wifi at airports and there are jacked up super high rates at each airport. When I had a delay in Philadelphia my only choice to check my email for an hour was to fork over ten bucks for an hour of connectivity. The damn phone company wanted me to pay ten bucks an hour via credit card and to sign me up for God knows what annually renewing plan with the devil. It sucks so bad that I saw a number of power user dorks using a Bluetooth enabled cell phone to connect to the net for brief periods of time and not use the expensive Wifi network run by some damn phone company. If I ran things I would have a Wifi vending machine that would take a dollar cash and then give you an hour of net connection time on the Wifi network. If I land in some place for a connecting flight I am damned if I am going to pay some service plan and sell my soul just to check my email for ten minutes before my next flight leaves. There should also be more power outlets for laptop users who have four hours or so to kill. Then again this is the same place that has the balls to expect you to pay seven dolors for a beer.
Pre-paid phone cards are awesome. You can call people and not get screwed on cell phone roaming charges. They don't cause brain cancer or make you look like an asshole when you are driving. Phone cards also never ring in movie theaters and they don't dick you over with some insane monthly plan. Except for the times when your girlfriend has her answering machine turned off Phone cards rock.
If you have a laptop computer by all means get yourself a second battery. My iBook can get between four and four and a half hours on a single charge. By having an extra battery I can take a nine hour flight from Seattle to Washington DC and watch the entire classic StarWars trilogy instead of some damn Richard Gere movie that the airline wants to show.
When airlines don't give you the food that you paid for but try to sell you the same shitty tasteless food for seven bucks a pop it really seems cheap. I know that they are hurting giving the weak dollar and mile high oil prices due to the record level federal deficits but asking me to pay seven bucks for a shitty smelling TV dinner is just plain pathetic and sad.
In hotel Wifi rocks my world. The hotel that I stayed in had free wifi that was fast and required no passwords I had a blast on it and it was a constant source of entertainment. Also if you are inclined bring your own damn pr0n on a DVD to avoid interesting business trip spending reports.
Dunkin Donuts espresso sucks but their donuts and so insanely good.
I don't think I have ever had food from a sports bar that did not give me heart burn. Also when the airborne drink and pretzel wench comes if you ask for a can of Bloody Mary mix or Ginger Ale they are more likely to leave you the can. If you ask for a pop they are more likely to only pour you half a can and dick you over by saving the rest for the next chump.
An iPod will save your sanity when you are stuck in airports for two days straight. Paperback books also help.
Ok why the hell will magnetic interference from my damn iPod cause the plane to crash and burn when they are taking off and landing but the internal TV system on the plane is A-OK. You know we do have an FCC that makes damn sure that our nerd products do not leak massive amounts of nasty radio emotions so I really think it is pretty safe to listen to your iPod for the entire flight.
If you are going to watch DVDs on your laptop make sure that you pack a selection of movies that you would not be embarrassed to watch with a little old lady sitting next to you. The next time I fly cross country I am going to have Airport, 2001 and Fight Club on DVD to keep me company.
Jake at March 13, 2005 
Rants
Comments
If I had known you were stuck in Philly, I'd have stopped by to introduce myself and keep you company!
Posted by: Bryan of Stillnotcool.com at March 14, 2005 5:01 AM
Although they are being paranoid, of course, the reason you can't use the iPod is that it wasn't tested to the same standards for stray RF as the equipment on the plane. Now, why they don't just test them according to those standards, I don't know. :P
Posted by: John at March 14, 2005 6:25 AM
In New Zealand, they're phasing out the little biscuit that you get during national flights.
But it's at a stage where you can fly to Australia RETURN for what it would cost to fly to the North Island RETURN.
Posted by: Matt at March 14, 2005 10:51 AM
Jake,
Hey, if you fly American Airlines, you pay more for your ticket, but they have electrical outlets under all the seats for you to plug your laptop into.
seth
Posted by: seth at March 16, 2005 9:36 AM
I travel a LOT (lately it's been weekly), and I take my iBook with me all the time.
Skip the batteries entirely. Buy an Air/Auto power adapter and plug right into your seat. I bring a huge stack of DVDs with me when I travel, and I can watch completely uninterupted.
This week I flew to the Uk, and on the flight there I watched the extended Fellowship of the Ring (plus Alias, The Simpsons, and some other stuff) and on the fligt back I watched the extended Two Towers (plus tons of other stuff).
There's nothing like it.
Posted by: jason at March 20, 2005 8:21 AM
Oh, and American doesn't have power outlets on all seats...in the front half of the plane they're on almost all of them, but as you get to the back it starts to go to every other row. You can check a diagram on American's web site to make sure you get a seat with a power outlet.
Posted by: jason at March 20, 2005 8:22 AM
Since I have an extra battery for my iBook and an iPod mini to listen to I don't really need to plug in while flying and I don't fly that much.
Posted by: Jake of 8bitjoystick.com at March 20, 2005 10:19 PM
