Can’t Use Gadgets on a Plane?
While I was sleeping today (or maybe while I was in my 7am meeting 
, terrorists supposedly were going to execute a plan to blow up a plane using liquid explosives disguised as drinks and other common liquids. These explosives were to be detonated with things disguised as common electronics like iPods, mobile phones, and laptops. Now the UK has banned liquids and electronics from being carried on the plane.
Great. I might as well check all my luggage now because that’s about all I carry with me: electronics. I carry my laptop and several mobile phones. If I can manage, I’ll also carry all my clothes with me too, so I don’t have to check luggage, which always adds at least a half an hour to the whole process, especially at Sea-Tac, where they can never seem to get the luggage out in any reasonable period of time.
And man, I feel sorry for the people travelling to the UK. Flights to the UK, at least from the west coast of the US, are long. Sitting in a plane for 8 or 9 hours with no good entertainment is just no fun. But I guess people did it for decades before. Talk about being disconnected, but maybe it’s good to have this “forced disconnection.”
One alternate theory I have is that this whole story is concocted by the airlines to essentially force you to overpay for the crappy in-flight entertainment offered by the airlines. And they’ll start charging you for a drink too. Nothing like a captive audience to extract some money from and try and reverse their financial fortunes.
Hopefully this ban doesn’t extend to the US. I’ve got a big flight coming to Baltimore in a couple of weeks and I’d really like to take the opportunity to watch some of the video content I’ve stored on my MacBook.
(Thanks to Tom and Lon for stories)
