SOCIAL media is nothing new for the airline industry. Most carriers understand that peer-to-peer social networks like Facebook and Twitter offer a cost-effective and direct means of engaging with passengers—typically for service updates, conflict resolution and marketing. Even longstanding sceptics like Ryanair now pay their staff to interact with customers on social media. The airlines don’t always get it right, of course, but they are no more prone to blunders than anyone else. And yet one thing has been noticeably lacking from the industry’s social media landscape: a means for passengers to converse with one another not before or after their flight, but during it. Virgin America has now changed that by launching what it claims is the world’s first in-flight social networking app.
"Here on Biz" allows business passengers to connect to their accounts on LinkedIn, a popular professional networking website. Geo-location technology then checks whether any acquaintances in their LinkedIn network happen to be at their gate, on their plane, or indeed on another Virgin America flight. Passengers connect to the network via the airline’s Wi-Fi service; use of the app will be free until July.
It is easy to imagine practical benefits from such tools. Instant messaging facilities are commonplace in offices, enabling colleagues to relay questions and comments without leaving their desks. But, on an aircraft, colleagues flying in different rows (or, devastatingly, different cabins) have few opportunities to interact. The concept can further be expanded into more ambitious territory. When travelling by air to conferences, Gulliver has previously sat within earshot of fellow delegates whom he only later realised were attending the same event. These apps could make pre-conference introductions and networking easier. One day, they may even help do away with the dreaded name-badge.
Moreover, in-flight social apps need not be restricted to business functions. Here on Biz also allows passengers to connect to their Facebook and Twitter accounts, making conversations with non-work friends possible. Two old school chums might spontaneously discover that they are en route to the same Caribbean holiday resort. Someone circling over Heathrow might ping passengers on the aircraft ahead, asking how long they have been delayed. Depending on the type of application, hitherto unacquainted people may also decide to chat with one another. One rather ambitious app, Wingman, already allows frisky travellers to flirt with each other.
David Cush, Virgin America's chief executive, last year admitted that his airline had been “a little bit behind” in mobile technology. He should be praised for experimenting with this novel facility. But there will be plenty of critics too. Although cramped space and boredom will compel some travellers to seek out associates, others would surely prefer to be left alone. Here on Biz has privacy settings that hide your presence. But business travellers are increasingly expected to be on-call all the time. Peace and quiet in the skies could become an ever-more elusive concept.
Nonetheless, on-board socialising is an experiment worth trying. Along with business conferencing, idle chit-chat and dating, peer-to-peer gaming might also become commonplace. That would surely be a hit with young travellers, as well as more mature poker or bridge players. And for the airlines themselves, on-board digital conversations present new opportunities to eavesdrop on and better understand their customers, enabling them to respond with advice or—less appealingly—unsolicited marketing (Qantas already monitors what people say in its lounges via a tool called Local Measure).
There are pros and cons, then, and there will always be blunders. Last year, Virgin America allowed its customers to send drinks to fellow passengers via their seat-back entertainment systems. The airline said it would help male passengers “get lucky” in the skies. Many female travellers found the idea creepy. But with on-board Wi-Fi becoming more commonplace—and, in the case of carriers like Norwegian Air Shuttle and Turkish Airlines, free of charge—socialising in the sky is here to stay.
