Originally Posted by
orbitmic
And I agree with others that I am most grateful for blocking skype on AF's wifi. Many a times, people shouting at their laptop when I was trying to get a minimum of peace and quiet after a long and tiresome day or flight has made me feel on the verge of being homicidal. Even though I know I keep repeating the same things over and again, I also still think that with the increase of large lounges now for most airlines in their hubs, quiet zones should become a staple offer. I just don't understand why I am to be subjected to loud phone conversations that are uninteresting and intrusive to me while anyone would presumably (and understandably) start shouting and screaming if I played a Beethoven's sonata at a quarter of the volume on my laptop. I don't want to deny people the right to use phones (well, actually, I would really like to but I know it won't happen!
) but I don't think it is unreasonable for me in an increasingly mobile-phone-invaded planet to ask for areas where passengers who like me want some relative silence and myself could enjoy exactly that.
In your paragraph you yourself hit the hammer on the nail: it's not skype that is the problem, it's people talking loudly. Be it into their phone using a GSM connection, into their phone using an VOIP, be it using a VOIP connection installed on their computer, be it to each other sitting in the lounge.
Skype is just another technical method of connecting people to a phone conversation. Why this particular technical method should be banned and not others which may just as well lead to noisy behaviour is unclear to me. You could just as well ban ties because people using VOIP in lounges often wear ties.
Therefore I find it very lame to block skype. I often use it, on my mobile phone, interchangeably with a "normal" GSM connection, with my headset, making as much or as little noise as if I was using a GSM connection.
Thus: I am all ^^^ for condoning loud conversations, through whatever technical platform. People using loudspeakers for their phone conversations should be banned (which kills the "shouting at their laptop" syndrom, which indeed is terrible). Having quiet areas is also a good idea. However, I against banning a certain technology which in itself is not the issue but merely one of many possible conduits of bad behaviour.