Nary a week after JetBlue expanded its in-flight internet services on BetaBlue comes news that the airline's LiveTV unit will be picking up Verizon's Airfone network. As you can glean, the purchase is being made in order to further "develop in-flight email and internet services," and while no purchase price was disclosed by either outfit, we are told that LiveTV will receive "100 air-to-ground US communications towers and Airfone's corporate and government aviation clients on January 1st." That's nice and all, but can't we get something out of this sooner?

In a Harris Interactive survey of 2,030 US adults of whom, 1,778 have actually flown in an airplane, a full three quarters say that cellphone usage on airplanes should be restricted to "non-talking features." In other words, email, texting, and surfing the Web. That's a pretty significant majority seeing as how the EC has cleared the way for calls within European airspace. 69% of consumers agreed that if voice calls are permitted, a special "talking zone" should be established so that other passengers are not interrupted. While the survey reflects our own opinions, take note that the results benefit sites like Yahoo! Mobile, the very company which commissioned the survey. It's also worth highlighting a comment made by a certain Miss Teen, South Carolina who said, "That some US Americans should be unable to do so, because, uh, some-a people out there in our nation don't have cellphones, and such as, maps." Good point.

Despite the on-again, off-again worries about in-flight calling interfering with an airliner's many navigational gizmos, we have to admit, there's a part of us that really loves to hear a story about what happens when someone actually has the stones to ignore federal law and breaks out the phone. That's exactly what Texan Joe David Jones did on a flight from Austin to Dallas last week, receiving a message on his cell -- which he'd forgotten to turn off -- about his father's health and felt compelled to return the call immediately. He ignored flight attendants' requests to hang up, spending some 20-odd minutes chatting away, apparently with no ill effect on the plane's ability to fly without exploding, barrel rolling uncontrollably, or falling out of the sky. We'd expected that such a blatant disregard for ignoring crew instructions would result in some jail time, but apparently the gentleman simply got slapped with a disorderly conduct ticket that carries up to $500 in fines. If we'd been in the seat next to him, we'd have probably hogtied him with his seatbelt and thrown his phone down the scary vacuum-powered lavatory toilet, but at least we know exactly what happens now when someone says "screw you" to the in-flight phone ban.

That Air France in-flight calling trial is now well underway, and it looks like there's still some kinks left to iron out. The New York Times hitched a ride on a recent flight featuring tests of the system, and found that things weren't quite working up to snuff: voice quality was said to be like "talking to a small robot," only six passengers could get a signal at a time, Blackberry email didn't work, and calls placed from the ground to cell phones in the air went straight to voicemail. That's a pretty long list for a system that's been talked about for a couple years now -- let's hope OnAir manages to clear up some of these glitches before angry passengers revolt over not only having to listen to other people's conversations, but also their screaming over bad connections.

This could -- at least temporarily -- put an end the nightmarish scenario involving you, lack of sleep, and some freakish chatty Cathy plopped next to you by the airline. Lead co-sponsor Rep. Peter DeFazio, hopes the "Hang Up" -- madly clever name here -- bill will stop Airlines from finding yet another avenue to gouge you and maintaining peace and harmony by banning any in-flight calling. Of course, the door will remain wide open for SMS, mail, IM, and other types of electronic conversation, but we're hoping Skype and friends are on the muzzle list, too.

Not even half a year after Air France enabled passengers on its single OnAir-equipped Airbus A318 to send / receive messages and e-mail, the airline has went live with the second phase of the in-flight experiment. As of this week, guests who find themselves aboard the aforesaid aircraft can make / receive calls on their mobile at 30,000 feet. Reportedly, a dozen simultaneous calls are possible "per picocell network, as well as unlimited text messages and e-mails," and while pricing details weren't disclosed, you can rest assured it won't be a bargain. Nevertheless, the voice aspect of the trial is scheduled to carry on for three months, and we're assuming the results (read: whether annoyed passengers start assaulting chronic yappers) will determine if it gets rolled out to more of the fleet or quietly buried.

[Via WiFi Net News]

Like it or not, a new era has dawned. More than a year later than anticipated, Emirates says that the world's first authorized cellphone call was made by a passenger during an Airbus A340 flight between Dubai and Casablanca. Once the aircraft reached cruising altitude, passengers were permitted to make and receive both calls and text messages. Emirates plans to fit additional aircraft with the interference-blocking AeroMobile system later this year while adding BlackBerry and "other data services." To keep the annoyance factor to a minimum, the flight crew requests passengers to silence their ringers and will shut off the in-flight service when appropriate. For example, during long-haul, red-eye flights or breaking celebrity scandals on TMZ... we hope.

[Thanks, Jonathan F and Andrew B.]

The dream of being able to annoy everyone around you at 30,000 feet inched ever closer to reality today, with EU regulators recommending that member states approve a plan to allow in-flight cell phone use. Although previous studies have shown cell radios may interfere with in-flight nav systems, the new plan involves mounting a satellite-linked "pico cell" in the passenger compartment, which will allow pilots and flight crew to selectively enable cell services like voice and SMS. Unfortunately, the system only supports 2G connections, but if its successful, officials say it can be upgraded to 3G. Rollout is dependent on both individual countries and airlines approving the tech, but hopefully we'll be chatting away soon.

[Via Switched]

As the long-running fight for US in-flight calling (or the lack thereof) rages on, it seems that we're finally getting a definitive answer on the matter -- for the time being, of course. According to Telegraph Travel, Les Dorr, of the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA), stated that "proposals to lift the ban on in-flight mobiles had caused such an outcry [that] they had been dropped." Furthermore, it was noted that aviation authorities had "ruled out the use of mobile phones on planes for the foreseeable future." Unfortunately, there was little exaggeration beyond that, but it seems that in-flight calling on US flights is on hiatus for the time being.

[Via Textually]

The FAA's still hemming and hawing over how to handle the rather controversial issue of in-flight mobile phone use, but that hasn't stopped Europe's Airbus from pushing the issue on its home turf. Having already signed agreements with Ryanair and Qantas to provide service through its OnAir subsidiary, the company's been testing equipment to enable the use of GSM handsets for some time; the European Aviation Safety Agency's apparently pretty satisfied with how those tests have been coming along, too, having just blessed the system for commercial use. European travelers worried that this development is going to lead to a rash of incessant yappers on domestic flights can take some solace in the knowledge that flight attendants will be able to "manage" the service, even shutting off voice entirely while leaving SMS and data active. Look for OnAir service to drop initially on short flights in Western Europe, though Airbus intends to take it global -- if the FAA's cool with it, anyway.

[Via WirelessInfo.com]

The seemingly never-ending "will they or won't they" saga involving the FCC, the FAA, airlines, mobile carriers, and the extraordinarily annoying plane passenger sitting next to you has taken another unexpected turn this week. On the heels of a CTIA study suggesting that so-called "picocells" placed on planes to communicate with phones won't completely eliminate paralyzing interference with ground towers, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin suggesting that the feds should hold off on lifting the in-flight calling ban. Apparently, the big issue revolves around phones operating on bands that aren't supported by the installed picocell; in the absence of that local communication, the handset goes right back to mussin' and fussin' with the traditional towers several miles below -- potentially with disastrous effects to the network and other users, never mind the fact that no one's managed to conclusively prove that aircraft systems won't be affected. For what it's worth, the chairman's suggestion is just that -- a suggestion -- and doesn't prevent the agency's commissioners from approving the move anyway. While we're the first to agree that the thought of a couple hundred passengers yakking away in tight quarters is a starkly frightening one, we're not sure it's the FCC's place to be legislating away annoyances -- let the feds do their technical due diligence, we say. Word has it the picocells can be tweaked to fix the CTIA's concerns, and if that holds up, airlines will decide individually whether to let customers dial (or, at the very least, access data services) mid-flight. From there, we'll all be voting with our dollars.

[Via Techdirt]

If ASiQ has its way, worries about cellphones bringing down airplanes could soon be a thing of the past, thanks to its still well-guarded system that would let passengers make in-flight calls using their own phone. They're being stingy with deets on account of their patent status, but what we do know is that the system will consist of a device that's connected to your cellphone by either a cable or Bluetooth connection, and that it'll supposedly work with GSM, CDMA, UMTS and EDGE. It also won't be free, of course, but ASiQ says it'll be inexpensive. What's more, they claim they've managed to address the privacy concerns of other people on the plane. We still think the Cone of Silence is the answer, but we're guessing they've cooked up something decidedly less cool (and probably less effective).

[Via textually.org]