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Southwest Airlines Community

Why Fly? Wi-Fi

sheaser
Frequent Flyer B
Did you know that Wi-Fi doesn’t actually stand for anything? Sure it sounds like Hi-Fi which is (was?) short for High Fidelity—as in better sound quality of stereo records over their monaural cousins. But the name “Wi-Fi” was invented by a company called Interbrand. It seems that the founding members of the Wireless Ethernet Compatibility Alliance, (who were later renamed the Wi-Fi Alliance) hired Interbrand to come up with something better than "IEEE 802.11b Direct Sequence" the original name of the technology. Interbrand also created "Prozac", "Compaq" "oneworld", and "Imation" among other company and product names.
 
[asset|aid=355|format=image|formatter=asset|title=UnderRadome.jpg|width=222|height=153|resizable=true|align=right]This episode of Red Belly Radio was recorded on mobile studio N901WN, also known as one of our aircraft. But this aircraft is the first in our fleet with Wi-Fi! A group of Employees along with representatives from the company who developed the equipment, took a test flight recently. Interviews include Angela Vargo from Marketing, Doug Murri from Flight Ops Technologies, and Bill McNary the Vice President Business Development of AeroSat, the company who developed the satellite antenna. The video this week was from the test flight where the podcast was recorded. The photo on the right is of the antenna with the radome cover removed.
3 Comments
Jay_Holden
Explorer C
If you haven't read pages 182-186 in Jeff Jarvis' new book "What Would Google Do?" you need to go straight to the airport bookstore and buy a copy! Then email me about how we are going to use the same model at Kanakuk Kamps. Tell Dave Ridley hi from Joe White. Jay Holden Kanakuk Kamps Marketing Director jay@kanakuk.com www.insidekanakuk.com
flyingphotog
Explorer B
So cool! I can't wait to fire up my laptop or iPhone on board.
Mark_M
Explorer C
Wifi on planes is an absolutely fantastic idea. It will do incredibly well for SWA. If you make it free for 3 Mbytes / passenger / flight hour, and pay as you go beyond that (per flight or per month), you can provide a nice blend of service w/ fee. When people ask about laptop power, look at the emerging technology of PoE+, or power over ethernet plus. IEEE 802.3at. In a couple of years, we will be ridding ourselves of those proprietary laptop power bricks, and using power over ethernet ports to provide charging power. The system is sufficiently intelligent that it can manage power in an avionics environment, and the weight / seat is less than existing flight rated power systems. The cabling qualifies as safety low voltage, is 100% electrically protected, short circuit protected, you name it... widely available in plenium rated... and looks exactly the same as the Ethernet jack in most offices. Thank you, Mark