Baze

Then why are you belittling and bullying my post? It's a 2 way street my friend. Where was there any bullying in my post. Just stating a point of view as you are. And so far 2 people above got what I was saying. So feel free to work yourself into an early grave. More power to you.

SFflyer123

For those who want wi-fi and want to leave UA because there is no wi-fi, please leave. I have not been getting upgraded in the past 3 months for ANY domestic flight becasue there are simply too many people with UA. The more of you who leave, the better it will be for the rest of us.

BrettJG

Sir. With all respect, I'm not bullying your post and just because you say so doesn't make it so. (No early grave coming either tho u may wish) The original OP posted about leaving United because of lack of wifi, something I can relate to and posted about. It then morphed into a discussion of self important people who think they are special because they "think" they need wi-fi and then equally as ridiculously we meandered into a "discussion" of whether we truly need wifi on a plane with the insunuation being there's something wrong with those who think they do...You don't have to agree with everybody but do not imply there's something wrong with those who we view things differently. We all should be better than that.

LilAbner

"So help me God!!!" "If I have to stop this plane and come back there U's kids are going to regret the day U 2 were born"!!!!!!!!

BrettJG

You're a funny man and your irreverant attitude is appreciated in a world of outrage and self rightenous. Thank u

LilAbner

Shirley, U must be kidding?
... and don't call me Shirley!!!

TWA Fan 1

I now primarily fly Delta, not especially for the WiFi, but there is no question that for someone like me, who relies on the internet to get business done, WiFi on DL has been a huge productivity tool.

Also, while GoGo is not bullet-fast, it has always been perfectly adequate to use email.

I fly a lot of transcon, and on these flights, having WifI has made a huge difference for me.

I would actually be happy to be offline during this time, but the fact that this tool provides me the option to be productive has been very helpful to my business.

raehl311

Time is money. Is the world going to end if I'm out of the loop for 4 hours? No. Can it cost me money if I'm out of the loop for 4 hours? Absolutely.

Fortunately for UA, it costs me more time & money to fly out of a different airport than it's likely to cost me being out of touch, but if I had better options, I'd be switching - and most of UA's customers have other options.

76Patriots

I vote "simply arrogant" and surprisingly he/she isn't the only post here showing it. It's of the more arrogant posting I have seen in a thread (thought maybe I need to read more threads). For those with the mid air is for downtime mantra, that's great for you. Your work or schedule or routine allows for you to make your mid air time something to relax and do <fill in the blank>. But, fyi, this world is, and increasingly so, filled with people who have jobs that are done via connectivity to the network. I optimally fulfill my responsibilities by remaining in contact with my peers and subsequent customer issues (who oddly want immediate help when they have an network issue that is interrupting what they pay us for). And it isn't just the pure responsibility of it as my career is also bettered when I can be available to assist whenever needed. And this can be accomplished with that outrageously entitled belief that UA should provide what almost every other airline is providing.

Please stop, you embarrass yourselves. You are taking your own world and expecting it should apply to everyone when you cannot possibly know what the person next to you needs to accomplish in their world (arrogance).

LaserSailor

I got about a days work done on DL on wifi trips, called the CEO, and told her I'm taking Fri with kids.

However I still choose my carrier on travel logistics, not Points or perks, per company policy.

Baze

You have no clue what I was saying. And I don't wish an early grave on anyone. One of my best friends is dying of cancer at this moment with only a week or so to live. Much too young at only 58. And I Never called anyone self important and even stated I did not think that. And never said anyone who thinks they need wifi is wrong. You have read so much into my post that is simply not there I can only laugh. And I never said anyone with a view different than mine is wrong. Again, you are reading in things not there. Only gave my own view of today's society and it's need to be connected 100% of the time. My view, not yours, not anyone else's. Not trying to change anyones mind. Not trying to force anyone to do anything. Tried very hard to word it in a way that did not come across as you read it and others entirely got what I was saying. So then end result is, if you need wifi, move to another airline until UA gets it rolled out on the flights you need to take. Is that a better response for you? Gee, sounds just like all the other responses. So take a chill pill and relax and get worked up over things that are important to you. And if you are not sure what someone is saying, ask for clarification before jumping all over them because guess what, you may be misinterpreting what they are saying.

why fly

So after reading the thread,
UA will have faster Wifi than AA and Delta
UA will have wifi that works Atlantic and Pacific
A 747 is getting wifi fitted right now

If this is all true its worth the wait.

pWei

On a recent transcon delta flight where I've tried it, the connection was slow AND would get disrupted at seemingly random intervals. It's not very useful for doing work remotely. Email, sure, since that's async, but stuff like SSH, RDP, etc won't work very well.

FlyWorld

Take a look at Taskrabbit. You can do exactly that.

kbjarvis

Seems as though most people in this thread are missing on the economics of putting WiFi onboard aircraft right now - WiFi service is generally a loss-maker between the cost of the system (NRE, hardware, install, maintenance) and the cost of the data transfer as compared to the direct ancillary revenue. It is astronomically more expensive than the home-use equivalent.
The real money comes from the ability to drive passenger traffic to your airline and/or to somehow get a third party to provide the service to passengers on their dime (ex. Lexus and Google on Gogo in earlier times).

As has been mentioned, the take-up rate on WiFi (averaging between 4%-8% according to Gogo & Row44 publications) is dismal due to two main reasons:
1) the expectation that the service should be free (based on comparables in other formats, like McD's, Panera, Starbucks, etc.)
2) the expectation that if the service is paid for, it better be fast and it better be cheap (based on comparables with cable, DSL, etc.)

As has been observed on Gogo-equipped aircraft (keeping in mind that there are so many of these aircraft out there due to the vendor providing the equipment gratis to the airlines, who generally had no interest in making that loss-making capital investment), the more users you have, the worse the experience becomes due to bandwidth limitations to the aircraft. Interesting paradox, no?
The recent articles about Gogo raising prices on certain routes (SFO-BOS, SFO-NYC, I believe) to effectively throttle usage should have highlighted in full to everyone why carriers were not in a rush to pay for WiFi systems - those particular deals only closed because it was "free" to the airline.
FWIW, the LiveTV Kiteline solution was deliberately killed because the marketplace made it obvious that its limited bandwidth (1/3 of what Gogo offers today) was not an acceptable long-term solution. sCO saw the writing on the wall and decided to wait for a better long-term option, as did JetBlue.

The real issue in the marketplace for the airlines boiled down to point 2 listed above - passengers don't want a constrained product that costs a lot to use, so why install one?
This becomes especially relevant when you realize that an IFE system is generally in place for a decade at a time - there's nothing simple about swapping between providers and technologies. You have to pick the right thing the first time...anyone remember AirFone?

Satellite connectivity ends up being the gateway answer to mitigate the speed/capacity issues, but the "best" band (Ku or Ka, or even L) is debatable based on the desired coverage and cost per bit for data transfer. Row44 and Panasonic are now working to get Ku-band systems up and running smoothly while LiveTV is starting with Ka-band, but all providers have acknowledged that there is not a single right answer in this space for all carriers, and will likely provide multiple options to satisfy an airline's needs.
That being said, while the carrier may now be able to provide plenty of capacity, that still doesn't mean that there is anyone that is willing to pay for it at a given price, so it all comes back to driving passenger traffic to justify the expense.

If enough people are willing to switch airlines for WiFi access, then there is finally an economic game-changer. Until then, airlines just have a marketing gimmick that doesn't even pay for itself.