Netflix and Virgin America are joining forces for free in-flight streaming.
Turn on your iPad, the captain has just turned on the Netflix sign.
Have you ever wanted to binge-watch all of your favorite TV shows or old episodes of House of Cards that you may have missed but you are stuck on a 5 hour flight with no access to Netflix? Well, thanks to this new deal with Virgin America and Netflix now you can.
In-flight WiFi tends to be pretty crappy, unstable, and horribly slow. Most airlines, in fact, block streaming video completely. According to Forbes, the reasons behind this are pretty reasonable, “Airplanes rely on expensive and slow Internet-via-satellite connections that they then have to share to several dozen cranky, bored passengers. Streaming video takes far more bandwidth than, say, updating a Facebook post. It’s a numbers game, and the services that hog the most data are the first to go.”
But, thanks to Virgin Airlines new type of satellite-based Internet connection that means the company will be able to provide passengers with a streaming video. In fact, Virgin explicitly states in its press release that the new tech can support streaming and that’s where the Netflix new Virgin partnership comes in with an awesome offer. Free in-flight WiFi for subscribers.
Some streaming video services, like Amazon Prime, do allow you to download episodes for a short period of time in case you face a time period where you cannot connect to the Internet. But, downloading an entire series on to your tablet is nearly impossible.
Netflix, however, has maintained that they will never allow for this type of downloading, as it believes that given access to WiFi at all times it wouldn’t be required. And Netflix is pretty much correct. Being thousands of feet in the air and still having the ability to connect to the Internet pretty much illustrates the need for faster Internet not the ability to download episodes.
So, if you are wanting to stay on top of all the new episodes of The Blacklist, House of Cards or Orange is the New Black hop on a Virgin Airlines flight, they are Netflix enabled.
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Are you going to watch Netflix on board your next Virgin America flight? Do you think adding Netflix to Virgin America planes will increase your chances of flying with the airline? Share with us your thoughts in the comments below!
