Removal Of Personal Device Entertainment?
 

I’ve been on four different Gogo equipped Delta Connection (Skywest and Endeavor) flights since last week and noticed the only video content loaded was a few Delta promo videos.

I chatted with Gogo support and they said that Delta requested they removed personal device entertainment. To verify this, the Delta twitter team confirmed the same and only Seatback entertainment seems to be referenced on the website. Any idea whats going on?

I would guess this saves Delta a few 1000's of dollars. Seems like a cost cutting move, which should shock no one given the current state of the industry.

If thats the case, it just seems like an odd cost cutting move to make. Seems like costs could be cut in areas that have less impact such as there really is no need for the water/snack bag on short flights like TYS/ATL or SLC/TWF.

My opinion is that anyone that Relies on any airline IFE is behind the times. It doesn’t take a lot to have a tablet and/or an external drive to bring all the entertainment you need for a
domestic flight. This will probably be the future.

There would be people on this forum who would shout and scream if that water/snack bag was removed. Different folks value different amenities.

Might want to tell that to the ~50 percent of passengers who I see regularly using the seat back screens. The death of AVOD was predicted years ago and yet here we are. I find it to be one of the biggest advantages of Delta over other domestic carriers.

There are many of us , me amongst them, who do not care for IFE

This cut was also recently made. No more snack bags or any catering besides emergency water on flights 250 miles or less.

It has been this way for at least a month--on one of my flights there were only two videos on the GoGo On Demand content yet the setback IFE was replete.

Seems to make sense as a cost cutting move if they are paying some flat licensing fee to get rid of it, especially with passenger volumes being down.

That’s great. You have the option to not use it. Conversely, those who like IFE are SOL if it’s not offered.

there's plenty of cases where IFE is better. like when you are are using the tray table. or when you want to look straight ahead instead of craning your neck to look down

I hardly think delta would allow a division to create a new way of delivering IFE to passengers if they had any data showing it was 'behind the times'

And on the other side of the coin, AA removing IFE was part of my impetus to finally apply for a Delta status challenge (along with the "project oasis" cabin densification). I was based in PHX at that time and DL meant adapting from nonstop to connecting flights.

I had a stint in 2019 splitting between DL and WN and really missed the IFE. My neck and device battery life both suffer using a personal device.

Phone glitch, ignore double post.

This.

Furthermore, on domestic routes, IFE is actually a feature which distinguishes DL from UA/AA.

I'm not in the fraction of regular IFE users, either. But there are def flights on which it's very nice to have. I might usually bring newspapers, magazines, a laptop with work to do, a tablet loaded with my recent favorite series. But sometimes I forget to bring something to read or forget to load new stuff on my devices. Or I'm not in the mood for what I brought. Then it's def nice to be able to watch an episode or two of light entertainment on the IFE.

so don’t care. But don’t take it away from those who do care.