RSSFCC: Allow Wireless Internet on Planes
By Ed Oswald | Published December 15, 2004, 2:39 PM
The FCC board overwhelmingly voted in favor of allowing high-speed Internet on airline flights Wednesday. The vote opens the door for wireless access on commercial flights by 2006.
"If there is a theme for this meeting, it is that we want (new technologies) on the land, in the air, and on the sea," FCC Chairman Michael Powell said. "We are pushing the frontiers in order to bring the information age to all corners of the world." Part of the ruling also opened for public comment a proposal to lift the in-flight cell phone use ban.
At issue is if passengers want to deal with chatty cell phone users during a flight, which Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein says is not their job. "Our job is to see if this is possible and then let consumers work out the etiquette."
Verizon would also have a direct interest in the final ruling in this matter. Verizon Airfone is the only in-flight phone service available, and carries a steep price tag of $3.99/minute. Opening up flights to cell phones would almost certainly signal the end of such a service.
However, Verizon is making movements to control whatever high-speed Internet that would eventually become available.
It's pretty laughable that for years the message was given that using your cellphone on a plane would interfere with the planes navigation system, make it crash, kill everyone JUST BECASUE YOUR CELLPHONE WAS LEFT ON...
Now it seems something has changed, and it's now perfectly accectable from a technical point of view...
What a bunch of muppets..
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Hate to bring up a morbid thought - but remember 9/11.. none of those planes came down because people were calling their families.
At one time, yes, cell phone interference may have caused a problem. But now, I highly doubt it..
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A cell phone is designed to broadcast its signal over a short enough range that it is only taking up signal space over one or two cell phone cells. If you drive fast, you will be being handed off from one cell to another which causes a small amount of overhead. A cell phone in a plane would be seen by too many cells, and would be switching cells very quickly. It would take up 100x the system resources as a normal phone- all it would take is a few plane-bound cell phone users to ruin the reception and reduce the number of land users that can use the system.
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Now this is good! lol About time :P
Except the Verizon thing :(
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Verizon is going to try and charge people something retarted for Internet on a plane. Unless it's free I would not mess with it at all.
Nothing I do requires me to talk on a cellphone or work on a laptop during a flight.
I take that time to sleep and relax, so I am just going to turn the cellphone off anyway. And if we crash because Mr. Important kills us all with his bad reception...at least I was asleep.
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