Delta Inks Exclusive Pact With YouTube For In-Flight Viewing (variety.com) 47
Delta Air Lines has partnered with YouTube to provide ad-free YouTube Premium and YouTube Music to SkyMiles members on flights. "The deal includes a selection of curated content from key YouTube creators," notes Variety. The airline also said it would upgrade its fleet with better Wi-Fi and 4K HDR QLED displays, alongside AI-driven enhancements like a personal assistant on the Fly Delta app to improve travel experiences. From the report: Delta executives announced the YouTube deal and other flight-experience enhancements to its Delta Sync platform as the aviation giant gave an expansive presentation Tuesday evening at the Sphere in Las Vegas, in connection with the Consumer Electronics Show. Delta touted plans to mark the company's 100th anniversary this year, noting that it is the first airline to reach the centennial mark.
It's also no surprise that Delta is leaning hard into AI tech. The company hopes its Delta Concierge AI-powered personal assistant feature that is rolling out this year on its Fly Delta app will make strides in improving the overall customer experience. The goal is that with repeated use the Concierge tool will come to anticipate individual consumers' needs and help them streamline the logistics of travel -- or what Delta dubbed "contextualized guidance" on everything from departure gates to baggage claim details to alerting travelers to weather conditions at their destinations. [...]
Mary Ellen Coe, chief business officer of YouTube, emphasized that the ad-free YouTube offering will allow viewers to access streaming content as well as podcasts and music. She also asserted that consumers are increasingly gathering travel tips and inspiration through YouTube creators. "Creators are producing the must-see TV of today," Coe said.
It's also no surprise that Delta is leaning hard into AI tech. The company hopes its Delta Concierge AI-powered personal assistant feature that is rolling out this year on its Fly Delta app will make strides in improving the overall customer experience. The goal is that with repeated use the Concierge tool will come to anticipate individual consumers' needs and help them streamline the logistics of travel -- or what Delta dubbed "contextualized guidance" on everything from departure gates to baggage claim details to alerting travelers to weather conditions at their destinations. [...]
Mary Ellen Coe, chief business officer of YouTube, emphasized that the ad-free YouTube offering will allow viewers to access streaming content as well as podcasts and music. She also asserted that consumers are increasingly gathering travel tips and inspiration through YouTube creators. "Creators are producing the must-see TV of today," Coe said.
In flight viewing? (Score:2)
Wouldn't it be more useful to give you something to do while you are waiting for your delayed plane?
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Wouldn't it be more useful to give you something to do while you are waiting for your delayed plane?
Most airports have free WiFi.
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I think they should basically open the bar in the first class lounges. As it is, half the passengers need to have a couple stiff drinks to even get on a 737. Hell with Boeing's safety record as of late it would be safer driving. I figure it's less likely that my tire falls off an axel, or a door magically disappears from my car. Of course, I might have a high velocity impact with a concrete wall, but apparently that only happens in South Korea.
I'm a drinker, I love a pint or 7... but I think drinking on planes is a huge problem and we need far less of it. If someone is that nervous that they can't fly without a bit of liquid courage I'd suggest that air travel is not for them and they should just drive, take the bus, train or ferry instead.
However regarding your Boeing comment (or can we just start calling them Boing) the dreadful passenger accommodations (seats) on modern Boeings has sworn me off them, I'll fly an Airbus if I can as Airbus st
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f someone is that nervous that they can't fly without a bit of liquid courage I'd suggest that air travel is not for them and they should just drive, take the bus, train or ferry instead.
Another option is to not self-medicate, and actually talk to a physician or mental health professional about anxiety and mental health. ... just saying.
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Why would that be needed? How can you be bored in an airport. There's wifi, restaurants, lounges, heck I know this may be controversial in the age of 4 second attention spans, but take a book with you.
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Why would that be needed? How can you be bored in an airport. There's wifi, restaurants, lounges, heck I know this may be controversial in the age of 4 second attention spans, but take a book with you.
Flying is still a luxury. Those that can’t actually afford that luxury and yet still try and use it, are the ones who are bored. Blew all their credit on plane tickets and fees.
Besides, providing YouTube is more feeding addiction than entertainment. Scrolling junkies do that shit everywhere. Home, work, bathroom, airport. Location is irrelevant. That truth may hurt, but it’s best to know your customer audience.
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Flying is still a luxury. Those that can’t actually afford that luxury and yet still try and use it, are the ones who are bored. Blew all their credit on plane tickets and fees.
Dollars to donuts they still have a phone in their pocket, and the airport has free wifi. Even tiny airports with only two gates have WiFi. Being bored while waiting to board your flight is a problem of not enough individual imagination.
how, precisely (Score:3)
... Will an AI "agent" mitigate:
- shitty microseats that seem to get smaller every year ... Because THOSE are the primary drivers of passenger misery, not imprecise knowledge of the weather at my destination or lack of access to some shitty YouTubers.
- a boarding process that has been repeatedly mathematically proved to be the least efficient approach (5? different groups board ahead of "group 1" lol)
- shit food that now cattle class has to pay for
- don't even get me started on the microbial culture in your planes by the end of the day
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shitty microseats that seem to get smaller
If you want more space, you can pay for it.
There's no reason to impose the cost of more legroom on small people who don't need it.
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You are purchasing a ticket to transport a person. Not a specific number of cubic cm. This is passenger travel, not freight. People can't choose how tall they are or how long their legs are.
Your comment comes across as body shaming, insensitive, and ignorant even for 20 years ago. Improve.
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You are purchasing a ticket to transport a person. Not a specific number of cubic cm. This is passenger travel, not freight.
Yet obese people who can't fit in a seat are required to pay for two.
Why should vertical needs be treated differently than horizontal?
The average woman in America is 5'4''. The average man is 5'9''. They don't need extra legroom.
If every seat is spacious enough for a 6'4'' man, fewer seats will fit in the plane, and ticket prices will be higher.
You're expecting the many to subsidize the few.
If you want an "economy plus" seat, you can pay for one. Forcing that cost on everyone saves you nothing and there's n
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Improve and don't be so bitter about your own shortcomings.
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Improve and don't be so bitter about your own shortcomings.
If the seats are farther apart, fewer passengers will fit on the plane, and the ticket prices will be higher.
There is no reason to force people to pay for that extra space if they don't need it or want it.
It won't make your seat cheaper.
You want to screw other people out of spite, for no benefit to yourself, and you have the audacity to accuse others of being bitter?
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Wow, thanks for explaining basic economics to me, I had no idea.
I shan't read anything else you write, you obviously have significantly more time to waste than I do.
You still need to improve.
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This is passenger travel, not freight.
That's not how the airlines view you.
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Yes, because we absolutely aren't "imposing the cost of more legroom on small people who don't need it" when a husband and wife want to fly somewhere sitting next to each other, and both of those people happen to not be the same height, and one of them requires more legroom to be comfortable on a flight from Seattle to Tokyo.
How many skymiles members on a plane? (Score:2)
Typical plane wifi can barely handle a bunch of people browsing the internet at once, what hope in hell does it have of running many parallel video streams.
Re:How many skymiles members on a plane? (Score:4, Insightful)
what hope in hell does it have of running many parallel video streams.
If the choices are constrained to a few thousand videos, they can be cached onboard.
A 10 TB HDD can cache 2,000 HD movies in 200 grams.
Delta's plan looks like it was designed to reduce off-plane traffic.
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Well they could obviously implement it in a stupid way (and given experience with airline IT... maybe they will) but you could also imagine a clever implementation where you link your Skymiles account to your YouTube account and the system uses that to determine what to cache for each individual flight.
I have YouTube Premium which allows you to have the YouTube app keep a downloaded list of relevant videos on your device for offline viewing. Anecdotally, I've found it quite good at determining the kinds
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Literally in the post "The deal includes a selection of curated content from key YouTube creators."
So you will get access to all the cached/promoted stuff stuck in a harddrive on the plane, and access to anything else will be over the usual plane wifi which will be a bit crap.
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Have you never heard of edge caching?
There's a reason they aren't making all of YouTube available, and that reason is edge caching on board the aircraft.
Hmmm. (Score:2)
So, on Delta, every 15 minutes of film is followed by 5 seconds of ads?
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So, on Delta, every 15 minutes of film is followed by 5 seconds of ads?
I think that's Amazon Prime.
Stupid quote (Score:2)
>"Creators are producing the must-see TV of today," Coe said
I object to calling people who make YouTube videos 'creators', - like the people who make traditional television and movies aren't? Generally speaking the content they create is what would have been low-budget 'filler' before YouTube existed, only with less originality.
Just get it over with, and put a satellite link on the aircraft then let me buy my share of the bandwidth to do whatever I want with. Flight attendants can always be given the
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The "influencers" that don't want to be known as marketing shills begging to free shit to make bad videos about now call themselves "content creators" because they're trying to be above all the failed "influencers" while still being the exact same thing.
First airline to reach 100? (Score:2)
Delta touted plans to mark the company's 100th anniversary this year, noting that it is the first airline to reach the centennial mark.
The Netherlands' KLM (1919), Colombia's Avianca (1919), Australia's Qantas (1920) and the Russian Aeroflot (1923) would like a word with you. Delta is the first US airline to reach that mark.
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Qantas never crashed
Sorry Rainman, Quantas has had fatal crashed. [wikipedia.org]
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As Americans we're taught the rest of the world barely exists.
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Wow, check it out, a jock from the 1980s.
What they're not telling you (Score:2)
"Ad-free YouTube Premium" (Score:2)