Internet in the sky

Boredom looks like becoming a major moneyspinner for the American planemaker Boeing.

Instead of drifting in and out of a jetlagged coma or wandering aimlessly up and down the gangways wondering just when the bawling baby two rows back is going to drop off to sleep, passengers on the Seattle-built airliners will soon be able to surf the Net.

Using their own laptops, travellers will hook up to the onboard Boeing system and be able to send and receive e-mails, log in to their company networks, entertain themselves with live Web television or visit sites with digital music and movie libraries.

The inflight Internet is the last great untapped frontier in the information revolution and, according to some analysts, demand for the Net at eight miles high could be worth upwards of $US70 billion ($145.8 billion) by 2010.

But there is a price. Boeing's move, which follows it's own $3.75 billion purchase last year of the Hughes satellite network, has huge implications not only for airline profits but for cultural or political sensitivities across the world.

For a start, the skyhigh Internet connections would bypass existing inflight entertainment systems. Airlines like Cathay Pacific and Qantas are looking at earning top dollars by upgrading their systems to offer premium pay movies and to sell interactive shopping links to retailers, and even introduce inflight gambling.

There is already a credit card swipe slot in the handsets of many "free" inflight entertainment control units, ready for the day an airline wants to move into pay-per-view, video-on-demand services.

But aside from the commercial implications, the political impact of unhindered access to the Web cannot be discounted. In many parts of the world, including some Asian countries whose airlines enjoy high reputations, political administrations will find themselves in a bind.

They may not like the freedom of information and ideas offered by the Internet. Yet if they do not allow their flag-carriers to offer unrestricted access to the Web in the sky, they will cease to attract the dollar-earning corporate travellers for whom information is an addiction.

A senior executive in an Australian carrier says, "This is going to cause the biggest row you have ever seen when they realise that the Western invention of unstoppable uncensorable information is going to be an essential marketing tool for winning or keeping passengers.

"There will be enormous resistance to passengers being able to watch CNN or read outspoken newspapers live on their computers, apart from the wider worry of people seeing a crisis situation or even a soccer match pumped live on to their screens.

"But at the end of the day passengers will sit in their seats buying and selling stocks or reviewing their portfolios or teleworking their way across continents and oceans. This is unstoppable," the executive says.

Boeing's inflight Internet hook-up will be rolled out on domestic United States routes from January, with international flights next to be brought into the loop.

The hard sell is that to use the link, travellers will need a laptop computer with a subscription to Connexion by Boeing (who else).

Boeing's chairman and chief executive, Phil Condit, is understandably enthusiastic, claiming the "travel experience" has been revolutionised (again). But then, perhaps he has a point.

"The aeroplane will begin to look like your home or office," he says. "In fact, you will be able to see inside your house and check out what the family or the pets are up to if you have your own Internet-accessible Web camera set up at home."

With music and movies, Webcams and the ever-expanding menu of online entertainment, this may not be a totally relaxing innovation for those travelling with their teenage children. But the possibilities of constant Internet access from a plane seat have almost no limits.

Cathay Pacific's e-mail access system will start next year and will be installed in every seat on the airline's entire fleet. The Cathay system uses satellite connection and will allow 200 passengers to access e-mail at the same time.

- NZPA