What to Know Now

Ever groused about the slow speed of your inflight internet? You’re not alone. Ameican Airlines is so unhappy with the quality of its connectivity that it’s actually taking Gogo, its internet provider of record, to court.

At the core of the issue is the rate at which Gogo’s inflight internet technology is maturing and whether it (and its contract with American) can support the bandwidth that everyone including the YouTube hog in 16C can expect.

Nobody knows the full details of the contract that American signed and what it’s committed to, but with Gogo’s 2KU service around the corner, it’s a surprise that American is so impatient.

Something doesn’t add up. Gogo’s stock, meanwhile, has taken a beating.

Social Quote of the Day

 …yet Gogo still falls into the “better than nothing” category, doesn’t it?

@RickBullotta | Rick Bullotta

 

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Airlines

How Safe Were Airlines Around the World in 2015? Pretty Safe, IATA Says: Last year was one of the safest for airlines with the number of fatal accidents falling by two thirds — if you excluded more than 300 deaths resulting from a pilot suicide and possible terror attack. Read more at Skift

Airlines to Offer Cheaper Flights, but Are They Worth the Savings? Rock-bottom fares once unique to low-cost carriers like Spirit and Frontier may, in the coming months, be offered by all three of the nation’s legacy airlines, American, United and Delta. Great news for you and your wallet, right? The answer isn’t so clear-cut. Read more at The New York Times

Airlines Are Slowly Allowing Third Parties to Sell Their Best Products: The importance of preferred seating and other ancillaries to business travelers is well known, and the online booking sites with the ability to offer these products for their customers will gain an edge on competitors. Read more at Skift
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Airports

Commercial Flights Between U.S. and Cuba Can Officially Resume: The United States and Cuba signed an agreement on Tuesday morning to resume commercial air traffic for the first time in five decades, starting the clock on dozens of new flights operating daily by next fall. Read more at Skift

TSA PreCheck Lanes Won’t Be Members-Only Anytime Soon: The TSA said in September it would scale back the practice somewhat by ceasing the use of behavior detection officers and explosive trace detection sampling to route people into the PreCheck queue. Not so fast. Read more at Skift

Obama Administration Hasn’t Ruled out Privatizing U.S. Air Traffic Control: The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration is reviewing a House Republican plan to spin off the nation’s air-traffic control system to a nonprofit corporation and hasn’t rejected the idea. Read more at Skift

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Tech

American Airlines Suit Against Gogo Is Latest Development in Race to Offer Fastest Wi-Fi: American Airlines is suing its connectivity provider Gogo for the right to switch providers to ViaSat, which supplies high-speed inflight Wi-Fi to JetBlue, and select United Airlines and Virgin America aircraft. Read more at Skift

The Future of Business Technology Conferences — Skift MeetingsIQ: It’s not too difficult to predict the future. All you have to do is look at what kids are doing. Read more at Skift

Qantas Holds Tech Talk in the Skies During Australian Start-Up Flight: Qantas coordinated the world’s first in-flight Tech Talk on flight flight 73 departing from Sydney to San Francisco, as part of an initiative to promote the strengths and capabilities of Australian innovators in technology and science helping them make links in Silicon Valley. Read more at Skift

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Hotels

Expedia’s Hotel-Bidding Program Misleads Consumers Says Hotel Group: The American Hotel & Lodging Association believes that Expedia’s new hotel Accelerator program, which enables hotels to place bids to get higher placement in Expedia search results, is misleading and harmful to consumers. Read more at Skift

Inside Trump’s New Loyalty Program: Donald Trump wants to be President of the United States, but for now president of Trump Hotels (and a bunch of other stuff) will have to do. Read more at The Points Guy

Survey: Comparing Consumer Preferences for Airbnb and Hotels: Airbnb is less than eight years old, but it has already caused massive changes in the way people travel. While consumers may have initially been hesitant to try the service, a new survey from Goldman Sachs Group Inc. shows that once they switch, they don’t go back to hotels. Read more at Skift

Your Turn

Yahoo Travel (and many of its sister sites) is dead. More on the news from Skift.

Tips and Comments

Can be sent to gm[at]skift[dot]com or to @grantkmartin

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Photo credit: Still from a promotional video about American Air's international Wi-Fi services. American Airlines

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