Virgin America plans Wi-Fi launch party in the sky
Virgin America is teaming up with YouTube for its big coming-out party for its Wi-Fi in the sky service.
The California-based airline will launch its Gogo Inflight Internet service on November 22 in a flight over San Francisco. To show off how robust the in-flight Internet service is, the company is planning to stream a live video feed from the plane down to the ground to an audience attending the YouTube Live concert in San Francisco.
(Credit:
Virgin America)
The Gogo service will be available to all passengers on a single Wi-Fi enabled plane starting November 24. And by the second quarter of 2009, the company expects to offer Wi-Fi on its entire fleet of planes.
As part of the YouTube live video feed demonstration, 30 Rock's Keith Powell will be part of the show. He'll be filming a segment in-flight for his Web mini-series with co-star Katrina Bowden. After the flight, guests will then go to the YouTube Live event.
CNET Reviews editor Kent German and CNET TV correspondent Kara Tsuboi are planning to be on hand for the event, so check out their blog posts and video of the event. It should be cool.
Virgin America isn't the only U.S. airline to launch in-flight Wi-Fi. American Airlines debuted its in-flight Internet access service in August on 15 of its 767-200 airplanes. Delta Air Lines has said that it will outfit its planes by the middle of next year with Wi-Fi.
American and Delta area also using the Gogo service from Aircell. The cost of the Gogo service is $9.95 on flights of three hours or less, and $12.95 on flights of more than three hours.
Other airlines, such as JetBlue Airways, has been testing its Wi-Fi service on routes between San Francisco and New York. Southwest Airlines and Alaska Airlines are also testing in-flight Wi-Fi. And others such as United Airlines are considering offering Wi-Fi, but it hasn't announced tests or a commercial launch.
Marguerite Reardon has been a CNET News reporter since 2004, covering cell phone services, broadband, citywide Wi-Fi, the Net neutrality debate, as well as the ongoing consolidation of the phone companies. E-mail Maggie. 
- by cristencarvis December 5, 2008 10:02 AM PST
- testing -- please ignore
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- by cristencarvis December 5, 2008 10:06 AM PST
- testing please ignore
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(6 Comments)