Egads! Are Airlines About to Turn Off Our TVs?

(GIF: Getty Images)

This is one in-flight movie we think we’ve seen before.

The vultures appear to be circling what might be another airline perk that’s taking its last breaths: those seat-back monitors that air passengers use to watch movies and TV, play games, and order food. Airlines are now introducing new technology that some say threatens to do away with those ubiquitous touchscreens.

Delta just started offering its passengers the opportunity to stream in-flight entertainment on their own personal tablets, laptops, and smartphones via Wi-Fi. United is offering a similar option on some of its planes. And a number of other airlines are renting out tablets that passengers can use to stream entertainment.

Airlines are slowly adding features that allow passengers to use their own tablet devices for in-flight entertainment (Photo: Getty Images)

Airlines say they’re simply providing more entertainment choices to customers. But some say this is but a first step in sending seat-back monitors the way of free meals, free baggage checks, and Pan-Am: a one-way ticket to obsolescence.

It’s an open secret that airlines never liked seat-back screens. They’re expensive to install ($3 million per plane, says an article in the Wall Street Journal) and expensive to maintain. And because the bulky devices add a considerable amount to a plane’s weight (an additional 7 percent, according to one airline), a couple hundred of them can singlehandedly eat up an additional $90,000 worth of fuel each year.

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So with airlines having a clear motive, and with advances in streaming technology giving them an opportunity, observers feel it’s only a matter of time before they move in for the kill. “Airlines Are Tossing Seat-Back Screens,” reads the alarmist headline in one article, as others are ready to bury yet another dearly departed airline perk. Rest in peace, seat-back monitors. We hardly knew ye.

But there are two reasons to hold off on the wake. For one, airlines insist that seat-back monitors aren’t going anywhere. Also, even if they were, it appears many of us fliers never liked them that much to begin with.

Not surprising: airlines hate seat-back monitors. Totally surprising: passengers do too, according to a new survey (Photo: Corbis Images)

In a new airport survey conducted by research firm Osurv, 71 percent of passengers are receptive to using their own personal devices to view in-flight entertainment.

Osurv’s Daniel Abram was surprised by the results. “I thought passengers would be infuriated if airlines took something away that people are used to,” he says. But as far as seat-back systems go, lots of people wouldn’t mind seeing them go, for a variety of reasons.

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Most passengers surveyed said they would prefer to watch in-flight movies and TV shows on their own high-tech, high-def devices rather than on the clunky, obsolete ones you find on airplanes.

“People’s own devices offer better resolution and higher quality than what the airlines produce,” Abram says. After all, airlines can’t afford to ground their planes every other month to reinstall monitors every time the technology improves. But for us passengers, getting the latest high-tech stuff is as easy as taking a trip to the nearest Apple Store.

Many of us would rather watch our own screens than the old, obsolete ones on the airplanes (Photo: Katy Pearce)

Abram cites another reason why most fliers don’t like seat-back monitors: They’re stressful. In the Osurv survey, 42 percent of passengers complained that they got stressed out when seat-back screens malfunctioned, as they’re wont to do. More than a few of these passengers feared that a monitor malfunction might signal a possible problem with the entire plane.

Nine percent of passengers say they don’t like touching those germy touchscreens.

Did she wash her hands first? (Photo: Virgin America)

And Abram says that 16 percent of passengers feel that if those expensive seat-back monitors go away, airlines will be able to pass on the savings to customers via lower ticket prices. (To that 16 percent: We admire your optimism, but please don’t hold your breath.)

But all this talk may be academic, as the airlines insist that seat-back monitors are here to stay … for now. Here’s what some of the big airlines told Yahoo Travel about their in-flight entertainment plans.

Delta

Delta tells Yahoo Travel that it’s not only keeping in-seat monitors, it’s installing even more of them (Photo: Delta)

“We are simultaneously offering streaming content options and installing more seat-back systems,” says Delta Airlines spokesperson Paul Skrbec. He notes that in addition to the 140 domestic aircraft with seat-back entertainment, Delta’s adding the feature to another 150 planes through 2016. Plus, Delta has 100 brand-new Boeing and Airbus planes scheduled for delivery through 2018, all with seat-back entertainment.

United

Around 200 of United’s domestic planes have seat-back DIRECTV (Photo: United)

“For now, our plan is to continue with planes that offer seat-back entertainment,” says United Airlines spokesperson Karen May. On domestic planes that don’t offer that feature, she points out, United is installing entertainment systems that allow passengers to stream content on their own personal devices (it’s currently open only to laptops and Apple mobile products, though United is working to expand it to Android devices).

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“Everyone boards with an iPad or smartphone or what have you,” May says. “It just makes sense that our aircraft offer personal device entertainment systems.” But she’s quick to add, “We’re not doing away with seat-back monitors. It’s still something that’s very important to us.”

JetBlue

JetBlue helped bring seat-back monitors to the in-flight entertainment game (Photo: Jason Cosper/Flickr)

Seat-back monitors have been associated with JetBlue almost since the airline began flying in 1998. And they’re not going away. “In-flight entertainment is a very important part of the JetBlue experience that our customers have come to expect and appreciate,” says JetBlue spokesperson Tamara Young. She admits that the airline looked at removing the monitors during a recent aircraft redesign. But the airline noticed that its multitasking passengers actually liked using in-seat monitors while simultaneously streaming content on their own devices (“Customers were starting to double and in some cases triple screen,” Young says).

JetBlue found that some passengers just can’t have enough screens to look at (Anthony Quintano/Flickr)

So not only is JetBlue keeping the monitors, but also it’s adding more channels to its DIRECTV signal. Young says that JetBlue may be open to exploring future technology that will lighten the weight of those in-seat monitors (such as wireless streaming or small OLED displays that are part of the seat cover). “But at this point,” Young says, “we don’t see the seat-back VDU going away completely.”

Virgin America

Virgin has bet big on its Red in-flight system (Virgin America)

Virgin is not commenting on future plans for its award-winning Red in-flight system, which was the first to allow passengers to order snacks and drinks from their seats. But the airline points out that 80 percent of its fleet is now equipped with the new, faster Air-To-Ground Wi-Fi service, ATG-4, and it’s expecting to have its entire fleet equipped by this fall.

So don’t write the obituary for seat-back monitors just yet. And even if airlines won’t see a full-scale passenger revolt should they ever choose to remove them, the pressure’s on the airlines to provide an in-flight entertainment system that’s even better — without gouging passengers for yet another service that used to be reasonably priced. “Passengers want to have the same entertainment content they used to,” says Osurv’s Daniel Abram. Airlines can take their seat-back monitors. But they can’t take our movies and “Big Bang Theory” reruns.

As long as we get to watch Amy Farrah Fowler during our flight, we’re good. (Photo: Jennifer Martinez/Flickr)

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