Sonic Boom: Why Flying Just Got Really Ugly – And (Potentially) Loud

Sound the alarm! The in-flight cabin experience is about to get much louder – or so it would seem.  After months of debate and a government shutdown delay, the day many of us frequent travelers dreaded has arrived: the use of personal electronic devices (smartphones, laptops and tablets) is now allowed throughout the flight’s duration, including landing and takeoff.

While actual phone conversations and texting remain off limits, a new gadget acceptance precedent – one that could soon turn planes into flying commuter trains complete with loud and obnoxious cellphone chatterers – is taking shape.

Urgh. I can hear it now…

“Omigod, did you hear about Robbie’s party last week?! It was sick! Jacquie got plastered, made out with that guy from accounting and puked on her own dress. Total disaster!”

You don’t say. Do I really need to listen to this rubbish at 35,000 feet? No.

Fortunately, I won’t have to…yet. But, as I said, a change is already in the air and I don’t like it. Even with the provisos and caveats the FAA has included in the lifted ban – enhanced gadget use depends on the airline, the weather and the aircraft – the last vestiges of a place where books, magazines and some quiet contemplation don’t look antiquated are rapidly receding.

It’s ironic that a digital “last stand” is being fought onboard passenger planes that feature advanced avionics, Wi-Fi, flash food-prep technology and seatbacks capable of displaying live TV, movies and virtual shopping malls. Sometimes I feel like it’s a battle that should have been lost years ago. 

Only it hasn’t. The question is why?

I think it comes down to what air travel means to most passengers; whether powered by propeller or turbine, air travel has long evoked a sense of welcome disconnection. The fair-or-foul vagaries of weather strongly influence whether you travel at all. Once you’re in the air, pilots control your destiny. And if there’s a midair disaster, odds are you won’t survive. There’s a kind of peace in that morbid realization. Your life is in others’ hands. Cocooned by the whirr of powerful engines, millions of passengers take flight attendants’ advice to heart, literally sitting back and enjoying their flight – uninterrupted.

Even without nonstop texting and phone calls, some of that welcome quietude is about to be disrupted. Now your fellow passengers will board in zombie mode: plugged in to their private little worlds. Except, unlike with books and whispered conversations, smartphone and tablet games will inspire grunts, random screams, shouts of joy and spirited sibling rivalry. Changes like this will also inspire an uptick in Wi-Fi as passengers move – linked, synced and wired – from terminal to plane without worrying about having to power down.

Of course, it’s possible the coming volume invasion will be mitigated by more aggressive airline loyalty programs that section off “quiet” cabin areas and honor requests for hours of low-volume gadget tinkering.

One way or another, these changes are coming and it’s time we all face the music – shouts, screams, and any other cacophony that makes flying a louder, less enjoyable experience.

I must admit I’m dreading it.

Why the Lag in Airlines and Mobile Innovation? My thoughts on MobileMarketer.com

Mobile, mobile, mobile, mobile, mobile! Mobile seems to be mentioned in every other article and included in every marketing and customer engagement strategy – except when it comes to the airline industry. Mobile Marketer published my article yesterday about the economic potential that mobile technology has for airlines – even as the highly risk-averse industry seems to be fearful of incorporating these devices into every aspect of the passenger experience.

So, as the title of the column goes, why are airlines – which were truly cutting-edge during the Golden Age of commercial jets – so fearful of mobile innovation? Mostly, the current atmosphere of uncertainty in the commercial aviation industry is making airlines leery of implementing widespread tech changes if the ROI is hard to calculate.

But time – and consumers – won’t wait around: airlines should only look to how retailers and the hospitality industry are using mobile to drive engagement and revenues and take a lesson or ten from them. But that’s a topic for a future post…

In the meantime, you can read the entire article on Mobile Marketer here and I welcome your thoughts on airlines’ fear of mobile innovation in the comments section below.

Calibrating Your Crisis Management: Sometimes a PR Fail isn’t Fatal

As I dug into NBC’s recent coverage of Boeing Co’s 787 Dreamliner jet, which had suffered its third mishap in as many days, I was ready for action. Here comes another blog post chastising corporate America for failing to be transparent in their PR missteps.

But the story made me cool my jets.

While the Dreamliner’s problems aren’t trivial – a 40-gallon runway fuel leak, brake problems, and an electrical fire on three separate aircraft in three days – no one, not Boeing corporate, not passengers, not aerospace analysts, and not Japan’s All Nippon Airways or Japan Airlines, which purchased the 787s are freaking out.

Instead the news coverage had a very measured tone.  

In an almost deadpan fashion reminiscent of New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, the story’s point was simple. Take a deep breath. We’ll get the problems fixed. These types of glitches are common on new aircraft – the Dreamliner began service in November 2011. And no one was injured.

Of course, Boeing’s stock price did drop and concerns have been rightly raised. But NBC’s story provided lessons beyond appropriate crisis management.

Knowing your client and knowing how to respond when things don’t go according to plan also comes down to an appreciation of culture. I really believe that if this was a Boeing story with mostly North American players and not Asian companies, there would be a tendency to exaggerate the situation. 

There would be the obligatory quote of a panicked traveler and tacit threats of legal action following the harrowing and stressful experience of being aboard a damaged plane.

Many Asian cultures take respect very seriously. Which is not to say that others don’t. Even our clients and other companies within the same industries can have widely-varying internal cultures. Communications tactics that work for one company don’t always apply to another client, let alone another country.

For goodness sake, it wasn’t the Costa Concordia sinking.

Other airlines still want Dreamliners – NBC pointed out that Air China and Hainan Airlines  plan to keep their orders for 15 and 10 planes, respectively, further calming the situation. Qatar Airways Chief Executive Akbar Al Baker even called the planes “revolutionary.”

Imagine that.

Three nations (four if you include Boeing’s Chicago headquarters), separated by thousands of miles and with widely varying cultures holding similar, non-threatening positions. If only that happened more often. They don’t want to fan the flames of outrage or play the blame game; they want to admit fault, measure the seriousness of the situation and move on.

So, before adopting a communications one-size-fits-all approach, remember this story about airlines and cultural relevance. Sometimes a PR fail isn’t fatal. In other words, a two-alarm fire doesn’t require a four-alarm response – overreacting can be just as dangerous as under-reacting.

What’s your view on a “PR fail” and overreacting in times of perceived crisis?

Attention Airlines and Airline Passengers: Muzzle Your Mobile And Keep Your Mouths Shut

Dear Airlines and Loud Mobile Phone Users,

On a recent flight home to Miami, I had the unpleasant experience of seeing the mobile phone future unfold in the seat right next to me. Suffice it to say, I didn’t like what I saw one bit, and even less what I heard. A thoroughly annoying git, who, for love nor money, would not put away his phone, despite complaints from his fellow passengers. Instead, he chose to pollute the cabin airwaves with his loud, inane jabber and nonsensical information – information that certainly could have been saved for a more appropriate location. Like his office. Or better still, underwater.

Since the dawn of mobile technology, much has changed. “Brick” phones that looked like, well, bricks, morphed into wallet-sized flip phones. And thanks to RIM’s now almost extinct Blackberry (and later Apple, Android and Windows), our phones have grown “smart.” The mobile web is ubiquitous and whether you’re deep underground in some subways in Tokyo, or standing atop Mount Everest Base Camp at 17,598 feet, chances are you’re never far from a reliable cellular signal.

But one thing has remained unchanged. When you board any aircraft, you are reminded by the flight attendants to “please turn off your cell phones and other electronic devices as we prepare for takeoff.” Minus a few stragglers, the din of human voices soon settles and the thrum of engine turbines powers up. Wrapped in an auditory cocoon that shuts out the world, passengers have passed their inflight boredom by watching movies, playing video games, fiddling with their mostly-dormant phones, reading books, getting buzzed, catching up on emails, dozing off, or maybe doing a little shopping via the inflight store.

But if the Federal Aviation Administration has its way, as it hinted at in August 2012, passengers may soon be able to use their mobile phones to make calls during the flight. Before that fateful day arrives, I wanted to go on record loud and speakerphone clear, and say that I think this is a poor decision.

A very, very, poor decision.  

In the name of progress, convenience and peace to all humankind, turning on mobile phone capabilities inflight will undoubtedly turn one of the modern world’s last bastions of relative quiet into a place of chattering, annoying, and like the flights themselves, nonstop conversations. Make no mistake, I’m not a Luddite on the ground. But can’t we all just go on in ignorant bliss believing that mass mobile phone use would crash planes?

Sadly, no.

While a recent article haply pointed out that since 2008, passengers on United Arab Emirates flights have made approximately 625,000 inflight mobile calls with only two official airline complaints, somehow I’m not buying that “official reports” are an honest measure of p’d off passengers. So, please, to my fellow flyers, I beg of you, when the time finally comes when five-hour flights allow five-hour calls, consider this heart-felt plea: muzzle your mobile and keep your mouths shut!

And to the airlines: please, please, please don’t do it.

Signed,

Luddite in the Sky

#Number Forty Eight, The Week That Was

And what a fantabulous week it was, full of meaty goodness for the tabloids. Tiger seriously maimed his brand, a preggers lady pops one out on the plane, and the Italians almost lynched young murderess, Amanda Knox. Oh, Afghanistan will be the proud caretaker of 30,000 more US troops and consumers are finally spending a little bit more. Three cheers for consumerism!

Other news you could have used…

Newspapers
German publisher Springer wants to save the newspapers by, wait for it, charging for content. How original$#@*& But while there’s nothing new in that kind of wishful thinking, I wholeheartedly support Springer’s MO – charging for quality content and getting rid of the meta-philosophy of free. I’ve been harping on about this since 2005 – why didn’t anyone listen? Eric Pfanner writes in his article for the New York Times “Publisher Lays Out Plan to Save Newspapers” that Springer wants to create a “one-click marketplace solution” for online content, so that instead of separate pay walls around individual newspaper Web sites, publishers and Internet companies can work together. Can you see this happening, honestly?

And more about newspapers, checkbook bias
Blurring the very distinct lines between editorial content and advertising has been pooh-poohed for a very long time. But a bunch of ad guys in Dallas have decided to take over some newsrooms, because apparently some editors are ready to bend over and take it. think it’s okay to blend sales with editorial. Because of course the sales managers would never, ever get in the way of news coverage. Never. Of course not. We know that papers need to sell ads to stay in business, and I’d be the biggest hypocrite if I said otherwise (see above). But sales execs have absolutely no place in determining editorial coverage or what gets placed on those pages. Once they take over control of “messaging” in news, our trust of media is totally doomed. Millions of people have been up in arms about media bias over the past few months and the WH/MSNBC vs. Fox-Off, and this brings it to a whole new level: checkbook bias. It also smells of a massive ethics conflict just waiting to happen. Sadly, the winner will be the one with the biggest checkbook, not the moral one. I know that newspapers are trying out all types of different new business models, but they should totally trash this one. I work with newsrooms all around the country and if I have to starting ponying up to receive “unbiased” coverage for my clients, the PR agency model is so, so dead.

About the large and airplanes
I know I’ll be accused of being a fatist for the following post, but I’m definitely not. I used to be 65 pounds heavier, so I know what it feels like to be categorized as fat. But these days, when I stroll up to the check-in counter with just 5lbs of extra luggage and get walloped with a $100 surcharge, I take absolutely no issue with that airline charging an additional surcharge or fare for an extremely overweight person. A recent story circulated from FlightGlobal.com onto MSNBC and the Huffington Post with pictures of a man taking up half an aisle, a seat and then some. Airlines charge for extra luggage because it reduces the carrying capacity on the plane. There is a maximum weight (load) that any plane can carry and that’s why there’s a personal allowance. Someone who boards a plane and who’s used up 15 peoples’ personal allowance, not to mention spreading over to the next seat, needs to pay for their “extra share”. The only difference between that person’s extra luggage and mine, is that mine has to be checked. It’s not discriminatory: if you travel with a pet, you pay extra. If you travel with a child, you pay extra. If you travel with an extra 100lb belly, you pay extra. Conversation over, next!

Dead man rocking
At first I laughed and then when I read the story, I cried. A 33 year-old man had be cut out of his recliner after spending 8 months in it. It’s a sorry state when you’ve allowed yourself to get to a point when you cannot move or get up from a chair. 550lbs? No one needs to resign themselves to being that heavy. I feel guilty if I sit on my behind for more than 5 hrs at a stretch (13 is my record, I had a lot of proposals to knock out). And it’s just as sad when your partner watches idly and does nothing to intervene. But what’s really sad is that the healthcare system is simply not there for people like the Webbs. Live in a mobile home in a low-income community and have no health insurance. It’s not a pretty picture to be sure, but it made me cry nonetheless. I’m just wondering if the recliner was a La-Z-Boy?

Porn, porn wherever you are
Love porn? There’s a new app for that. Called MiKandi, Mobile Marketing Watch reports that the world’s first adult-only app store was recently launched for Android devices, but not the iPhone. I wonder what Apple’s afraid of? In the porn-only store, users can search a range of free and paid applications, post reviews and join discussions – all in the privacy of the bus, train or office cubicle. In a long meeting full of boring PowerPoints, MiKandi now comes to the rescue. Mobile phone come out, come out wherever you are.

Putting Tiger’s tangles to rest
Tiger Woods to media: I don't need you bums. Thank you Tiger, we’re all ready to move on the next philanderer now. What’s the chances of it being a women? Anyone?

Here’s to another great week everyone!

Vanessa