News

By: pdaBlast! Staff

February 04, 2005

http://gadgets.pdablast.com/articles/2005/2/200524-American-Airlines-Offers-Portable.html

American Airlines is about to start offering its passengers a portable entertainment device on some of their flights. The device, which looks like a small laptop, will have TV, music, games, movies, and even copies of major newspapers. Passengers will be able to rent the devices for $7.95 by swiping a credit card in the device.

Why would American offer a portable device? The airline says they are facing competition from low cost airlines who offer hip marketing and lots of onboard entertainment. Because most of American`s planes are MD80s, the company could retrofit their planes with inflight entertainment systems but that would be costly.

American is starting to test the devices this week on two flights: LaGuardia to Miami and LaGuardia to Dallas. The airline is confident the portable entertainment device technology will be offered soon on all of its MD-80 aircrafts.