Air China has announced that it will start offering wifi on its international flights starting tomorrow. Not for free, but USD 26.95 is not too bad if you can work for a couple of hours while flying to Europe, Australia or the US. KLM is still not offering it, the only thing they currently offer is sending emails and SMS through your personal video screen (for a few dollars per mail). Not being able to offer wifi soon might cost them potential business customers.
Several airlines flying from Shanghai to Europe are offering it now (among others Lufthansa and SAS), although I have to admit that I often hear stories that it does not work flawlessly. Furthermore it is annoying to hear your co-passengers constantly call their friends or family for free through Skype. Airlines need to find a solution for this soon before it gets out of hand.
🙂 the time flying was an opportunity to escape from your office, mobiles etc. is gone.
Cathay Pacific offers brief surfing as well using it PCCW Netvigator service. I haven’t tried it yet though.
But…..SKYPE traffic can be blocked outusing a firewall or so….
i dun see anything wrong with using skype on a flight, you hav got ppl chatting onboard anyway. wouldn’t bother me.actually, wouldnt it be nice if you can talk to someone on a long haul flight when you travelling alone and ppl sitting next you not willing to have conversation with you. It may not be good for airlines as in-flight calling revenue will decline.