On Thu, 27 Jan 2011 21:21:05 +0000, Stephen wrote:

>> Yes, my phone couldn't connect to their wifi to get on the 'net.  It
>> would get an address and then immediately be dropped.  I'm guessing
>> they have something that knows the MAC address ranges for various
>> devices and blocks the ones that are cell phones - probably so people
>> don't have to remember to turn off their cell signal (which you're
>> still not allowed to use).
>>
> Nanny State ;-)

Thhhpt! :-)  Technically, that's not the state, that's the airline. ;-P

>>> Which reminds me: How did the passengers on the doomed 7/11 flights
>>> manage to phone home and leave messages?
>>
>> There's probably nothing that prevents the cell signal from being used,
>> and if the plane is already doomed, turning on a cell phone isn't
>> likely to make things worse.
>>
> I'm surprised they got a signal, that's all.

I'm not, radio coverage is generally not a problem - the two reasons I've 
heard for turning off a cell phone are interference with the onboard fly-
by-wire systems (something I still doubt, though not as much as I used 
to) and because the cell towers can/used to be confused by seeing phones 
switching towers so quickly.  The latter probably isn't as big of a 
concern any more for the carriers, and probably doesn't cause problems 
(per se) but just a lot of extra bandwidth used to switch the signal from 
one tower to the next, only to have it change again almost immediately.

Jim

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