Flying the Internet
Created | Updated Aug 15, 2006
Actually the title is pushing it a bit - or a lot for that matter as I'm now over European airspace and as normal the signal is like a naughty boy on a seesaw - every now and again it wallops down to the floor and my poor little computer jumps off the net. I don't want to take this simile too far mind you as I'm currently travelling on a 747 heading into London from Heathrow and I don't want to complete the concept of falling back to Earth with a thud that my weak Seesaw idea inevitably leads me to.
Now for the uninitiated, what I'm doing is connecting through Boeing's Connexion system from my seat in cattle class through a wireless network out into the ether (presumably up to a passing satelite). I've done this on each of my flights back and forth from Singapore since they introduced it about a year ago. All I can say is that it is the greatest service to long-haul passengers anyone has yet come up with. Instead of 13 hours relentless bum-numbing boredom trying to watch films on a screen that portable DVD player owners would scoff at, while straining to hear the actors over the drone of the Rolls Royce engines, I can instead link up, launch Skype, chat to friends and family, update a few customer websites, browse the news, and of course add an entry to H2G2.
Bliss!
The hours just wizz by.
I can look out my window, see the Himalayas or gaze upon the Caspian Sea (or See as I slightly mistyped earlier, causing me to double check there wasn't a pope sitting on a boat in the middle of the water), and natter to my 84 year old Dad about the extortionate Cotswold District Council charging £14 to have an old settee removed, or saying cherrio as he nips up the garden to dig some sprouts.
My interconnected life suddenly takes on a new turn of complete and utter disjointedness. Not just the normal sitting in my office in Perth chatting simultaneously to people in Canada about Jamacian calling cards, Christchurch about a Tongan resort site, or England about how anyone can expect to get away with a domain name that long. Instead, I do all the same things with my little iBook perched on the seat tray as my plane quietly eats its way through the atmosphere (literally, sadly) as it takes me half way around the globe.
Its hardly suprising I no longer have any sense of proportion, let alone stable geography.
Just one little question though. Why is it I can fly across the heights of Asia, the plains of India, the great inland seas, yet the moment I get to Europe the signal keeps dropping! Maybe as I approach the old world some ethereal force takes hold and quietly applies a brake. After all, Europe is home to the slow food movement, so maybe its just giving me a little nudge to remind me to slow down, look around, and enjoy what a marvellous place I'm coming home to, even if only briefly.
Now for the uninitiated, what I'm doing is connecting through Boeing's Connexion system from my seat in cattle class through a wireless network out into the ether (presumably up to a passing satelite). I've done this on each of my flights back and forth from Singapore since they introduced it about a year ago. All I can say is that it is the greatest service to long-haul passengers anyone has yet come up with. Instead of 13 hours relentless bum-numbing boredom trying to watch films on a screen that portable DVD player owners would scoff at, while straining to hear the actors over the drone of the Rolls Royce engines, I can instead link up, launch Skype, chat to friends and family, update a few customer websites, browse the news, and of course add an entry to H2G2.
Bliss!
The hours just wizz by.
I can look out my window, see the Himalayas or gaze upon the Caspian Sea (or See as I slightly mistyped earlier, causing me to double check there wasn't a pope sitting on a boat in the middle of the water), and natter to my 84 year old Dad about the extortionate Cotswold District Council charging £14 to have an old settee removed, or saying cherrio as he nips up the garden to dig some sprouts.
My interconnected life suddenly takes on a new turn of complete and utter disjointedness. Not just the normal sitting in my office in Perth chatting simultaneously to people in Canada about Jamacian calling cards, Christchurch about a Tongan resort site, or England about how anyone can expect to get away with a domain name that long. Instead, I do all the same things with my little iBook perched on the seat tray as my plane quietly eats its way through the atmosphere (literally, sadly) as it takes me half way around the globe.
Its hardly suprising I no longer have any sense of proportion, let alone stable geography.
Just one little question though. Why is it I can fly across the heights of Asia, the plains of India, the great inland seas, yet the moment I get to Europe the signal keeps dropping! Maybe as I approach the old world some ethereal force takes hold and quietly applies a brake. After all, Europe is home to the slow food movement, so maybe its just giving me a little nudge to remind me to slow down, look around, and enjoy what a marvellous place I'm coming home to, even if only briefly.
