United guests may now reach cruising altitude with a new, personalized in-flight entertainment system. United is the first U.S. carrier to offer iPod and iPhone connectivity to its in-flight entertainment system, enabling customers to enjoy their individual content on a 15.4-inch personal television, all while the iPod or iPhone charges.
The first aircraft with iPod and iPhone connectivity is scheduled to depart at 5:40 p.m. from Washington, D.C. to Zurich as United #936, and it will fly primarily on trans-Atlantic routes. United’s entire fleet of international, widebody aircraft are being reconfigured over the next two years with lie-flat seats, on-demand entertainment, and iPod and iPhone connectivity in first and business class.
“Our guests may now watch or listen to what they want, when they want with programming they choose,” says Graham Atkinson, United Airlines – executive vice president and Chief Customer Officer, in the press release. “United will continue to provide services and technology that makes our customers’ travel experiences more relaxed and enjoyable.”
“The iPod and iPhone have become essential for millions of travelers around the world,” said Greg Joswiak, Apple’s vice president of iPod & iPhone Product Marketing, in the press release. “We think United customers are going to love being able to listen or watch personal music and video content on their iPod or iPhone via the in-flight entertainment system, and we can’t wait for United to roll this out to their fleet.”
Through a cable that supports iPod and iPhone via the 30-pin connector, customers may watch and enjoy their personal content on United’s in-flight entertainment system. Technology for the connectivity was developed by Panasonic Avionics Corporation.
The customized video and audio options complements the more than 150 hours of movies and television shows available on-demand on United’s newly-configured international aircraft, as well as games and XM radio.
United was the first US carrier to introduce lie-flat business class seats in November 2007. More information about these seats – and the International Premium Travel Experience – is available at suitedreams.united.com
MacDailyNews Note: Thank you for your patience as our developer continues working on figuring out why the index page is suddenly causing our site to grind to a halt. We hope to have the solution soon.
Firstly, God bless the 30-pin connector!
Secondly, I presume the Zune and the Blackberry will have the same support…What’s that?…No…Good Lord, I’m surprised!</sarcasm>
you can’t stop the sun from rising
Yo MDN – WTF!!
Love your site dude but seriously – who’s workin’ the code? I design sites for a living and cannot believe that its taking them this long to “debug the home page”.
Need some help?
It’s time for a hybrid, the ZuneBerry.
It will push and squirt your files and songs all over the cabin.
“Need some help?”
MDN….Yes please.
…Need some help? – Amen!
I dunno. I prefer watching the inflight maps.
I’m glad to see the server upgrade is paying off! I have never seen this site in better shape, than it is now!
(sarcasm)
This is great news. Now if only they can make USB plugs standard on all car stereos, that would be great!
Looks like UNTIED is taking the same approach as the auto industry: give the people lots of toys and gadgets and useless fluff to help them forget about their $25 per checked bag, bad service, cramped seats, and otherwise all-around miserable travel experience…..
As a small business owner, I will be stuck in the back of the plane watching movies on my MAB that I bought with the money I saved not flying 1st/bus class.
Why the iPod or iPhone? why not the Zune? (lol)
This is the bigest iPod / iPhone accesory of all… a DC 10 or Boeing 737 or 747… imagine that!
Does any body remember that apple’s campaing “Imagine that!”?
A Boeing 767 makes a nice iPod/iPhone accessory.
” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”smile” style=”border:0;” /> A bit too expensive for my wallet, though.
Connection fees are $15/hr. per I-Pod in the first hour, $5/hr. thereafter. Fly the friendly skies my ass.
Your potential. Our passion.™
Looks like UNTIED is taking the same approach … all-around miserable travel experience…..
International First & Business Class is a whole different experience. For that money, the service is there. It’s better than domestic First Class. In the late 90’s, I just about lived in United’s Business Class over the Pacific. Earned literally a million frequent flyer miles.
A Boeing 767 makes a nice iPod/iPhone accessory. A bit too expensive for my wallet, though.
But not for the Google guys – do they share one 767, or do they each have one? Keep it at the military airbase right next door to the Googleplex!
Yeah, ZuneTang, but how do you connect your Dell Ditty to it? Hmm? They’d charge you $40 an hr, plus fear that it might interfere with the navigational instruments……
qka – “I just about lived in United’s Business Class over the Pacific. Earned literally a million frequent flyer miles.”
Did you pay for the trips out of your own pocket?
And for most of the world who does not fly business or 1st class on international flights United says:
You want iPod connectivity, stick the 30-pin connection in your ass. And by the way, we are now charging $50 a flight for the seat, otherwise you have to stand up.
hahah what a joke, anyone that thinks THIS site is a professionally run web site is just plain insane. This is the bottom of the barrel when it comes to Mac news sites, and I am not talking about the speed of the site. A billion ads, no original news, little takes on other peoples news stories, and no original content/reviews/anything, WOW what a catch!
Visit one of those other Apple sites in the left navigation, you will find better “news” for sure!
Love MDN content, but the interface lacks so much in style… In fact, I came to realize that I actually prefer the “broken” index page that we see now. It looks very 90’s, but is way more simple to read… Please MDN, don’t fix the index page…
Did you pay for the trips out of your own pocket?
Thank goodness, no. My employer did. They had a rule that if your airline trip had any leg longer than 5 hours, you could upgrade to Business Class. Once I got an upgrade to First. Nice, but not worth the price difference from Business. On the other hand, upgrading from Coach to Business was definitely worth it.
I was traveling from upstate NY to Australia, Hong Kong, and Shanghai, if you are curious.
And that little map on the screen, using GPS to show your position, was great. On an 18 hour flight from ORD to HKG, it helps with the “Are we there yet?” Someone earlier was making fun of it. Not me!
I for one enjoy the MDN site – their takes, Steve Jack’s comments, and of course, the comments people post.
Given that MDN is supported by ads – and not directly by us the readers, I don’t have any reason to complain. If I didn’t care for the placement of the ads, the overall look, or whatever reason, I would stop visiting the site. I appreciate that MDN is trying to make the experience better for all of us through server upgrades and the like will generally “listen” and often respond to people’s comments.
The Main / Index page is “down”. So what? MDN has a temp page that works just fine. If the temp page was causing excessive delays, reduced functionality, etc, then I might bring the subject up. Their temp page works just fine. What’s the big deal?
I’m not a code monkey so I can’t comment on how long a fix should or should not take. But given their temp page doesn’t affect me or the functionality of the web site – they can take as long as they need to “fix” the main page. Hell they can use the “temp” index page as the new look and feel for the site. No doubt there would be complaints.
Though not the perfect solution – I’ll tell ya how long it would take me to “debug the home page”.
19 seconds.
Take the page your currently staring at, save it as a new name. Fill in new content. Tah dah!! Fixed index page.
I gotta believe anybody could figure that out. Must be something else going on. Hmmmm …
I know what the problem is:
They are trying to figure out how to get 10 pop up windows to launch on page load. Current setup only allows 2.
@Zune Tang®
I wonder how much of a kickback Universal gets from that connection fee.