Eat Your Heart Out, Magellan!

If you're wondering what that previous entry was all about... that really was me blogging (indirectly) from my airplane, in the skies above Iran, about 38,000 ft. up there. I suspect in a few years internet on airplanes, which is already being tried here and there, will be widely available (for a price). All I had was the ability to send e-mail, which I sent to my girlfriend Riley, who posted it right away to the blog. Okay, a two-step process, but close enough for now. Of course they charge $2.50 per e-mail, and they only give you 150 characters (that's characters, spaces included, not words), thus the brevity of the message.

I am happy to report, however, that Jet Airways, an Indian carrier I had never heard of before, is an excellent airline. Great service, clean modern planes, good (Indian) food, free wine with your meal, and the best entertainment system so far I've ever had on a plane. They have about thirty movies, American & Indian, and it's really a good selection, plus tv shows, news, games, etc. But the good part is that you totally control them. Instead of all the movies starting at the same time, it's like having your own DVD player. You start a movie when you want, and you can pause it to go to the bathroom, talk to the flight attendant, take a nap, whatever. Here's a fuzzy picture of the screen with the play-pause-ff-rewind controls at the bottom:














Yeah, that really is Beowulf. I am here to talk about animation, after all.

If you're wondering about America's competitiveness in the world, all you have to do is compare United, Delta, and American with Jet Airways, Air Japan, and Air France. Kind of sad.