A rant on airlines … – blogdoch reloaded

Yeah, well. I’m going to head off to the US for more than a week, and after having been offline at Swiss over the north atlantic last year, this time I tried to increase my luck. Will it blend?

United-WiFi — United -- with per-flight info

What I actually booked was an United Airlines flight from DUS to EWR, but that one would be “operated by Lufthansa”. I did opt for Lufthansa as teltarif.de (German language link) stated that e. g. United only just started with transatlantic WiFi whereas Lufthansa states (German language again) that ‘most’ machines, except A380 and the 747, should be fitted with the necessary gear by end of 2012:

Typisch deutsch -- "if you're lucky, you hit a flight on which there will we WiFi"

Immer mehr Langstreckenflugzeuge haben ihn schon: Lufthansa FlyNet®, den ersten Breitband-Internetzugang an Bord.
Voraussichtlich bis Ende 2012 wird der überwiegende Teil der Lufthansa Langstreckenflotte mit FlyNet® ausgestattet sein, ausgenommen A380 und 747 – sie werden sukzessive nachgerüstet.

Google translation:

More and more long-haul aircraft have it already: Lufthansa FlyNet®, the first broadband Internet access on board.
By the end of 2012, the majority of Lufthansa long-haul fleet will be equipped with FlyNet®, except A380 and 747 – they are being successively.

In contrast, United does give you a preview on what’s planned to be available on a specific flight on a specific date — well, for my UA flight, the answer is unfortunately they don’t know and that it’s operated by Lufthansa. For the pure UA part of it, EWR—BOS, it states:

Bordunterhaltung:
Overhead video and audio programming are available. Or listen to live cockpit communications with air traffic control on Channel 9, a feature that’s unique to United.

Well, I’ll need to play John McClanes wife it seems ;)

Even Delta, the folks that provide you with an Android- and Windows Phone-App that requires you to login via a PIN, they do not supply anymore, gives out details like “WiFi enabled” or not an a flight you intend to book.

And, last but not least, Lufthansa hates Andriod (German language twitter post):

https://twitter.com/wusel/status/289934321266089984

‘Bye, bye, Arschgeweih’ — so, which airline does it better?