Virgin America Unveils Plans for Next Gen In-Flight Entertainment

Virgin America, the first carrier to offer fleetwide WiFi in May 2009, will continue its commitment to in-flight digital innovation with the next iteration of its Red entertainment platform.

The new Red system, slated for a late 2012 consumer release, includes larger, high-definition touchscreen seatback monitors, full Wi-Fi connectivity and four times more entertainment content. It will also allow passengers to connect their own electronic devices to the system pre-flight, in-flight and post-flight.

“Red is still the most advanced entertainment system in the domestic skies,” says Abby Lunardini, VP of corporate communications for Virgin America. “Other airlines are not making an investment in in-seat entertainment; they’re just doing WiFi. Fleet WiFi will always be a focus for us, but our built-in entertainment system is still important, and we think we can offer the best of both worlds.”

Red usage has increased by 20% each year since 2008. Passengers tend to multitask in-flight, using both the entertainment system and WiFi on their personals devices, Lunardini says.

When the upgraded monitors and the new Red entertainment platform reach consumers in 2012 — the system is currently in development — the most noticeable change, apart from the larger screen size, will be the addition of full WiFi connectivity, providing passengers access to the unfettered web via the seatbacks in front of them. Although still being fleshed out, the new Red, as Lunardini envisions it, will also include applications for easy Facebook, Twitter and other social network access.

“This is a significant investment for us,” Lunardini says of the company’s commitment to reworking Red. “We want to stay ahead of the path … a lot of people fly with us because it. We’re an entertainment-driven brand … and we did not want to stand idle.”

The next iteration of Red is being announced Tuesday at the 2011 Airline Passenger Experience Association Expo in Seattle with Lufthansa Systems, Virgin America’s technology partner. Back-end testing of the system will start on #nerdbird, Virgin America’s Twitter hashtag-inspired Airbus A320.

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Welcome To Mashable Entertainment

 

In the last five years, the entertainment industry has changed. Social and digital media are having profound impact on how to consume entertainment content created and distributed. Netflixservices, such as, Hulu and Spotify and the ability to use the content on different devices — cell phones, settop boxes, tablets, and much more — the enforcement institutions targeting and provide that they shall perish.

Over the past decade has been about the music industry of storytelling dualism to adapt to a large extent on the information in the digital time. Film and television industry (so far) to avoid the same fate, but the changes in consumer behaviors and to the host organism, the connections can result in an increase in the has changed in these fields too. Even the relatively new industries, video games, such as problems cheap casual games on mobile devices, the date of the commencement of the effects of the traditional console and PC game sales.

Our goal is to focus on technology and entertainment, and Mashable entertainment to their variable nature. To do this, we can cover the most recent events, which the social TVand innovation, connected devices, music subscription services and casual games.

For example, such as the Fall TV season of fishing capacity, we are going to see a collection of social media is to take the role of the traditional television landscape. During the period of our social TV monitoring and analytics-trends to see what the impact of social media is to Show the success or failure. We will also be reporting live 63rd on the Primetime Emmy Award on Sunday, Sept. 18.

Ten years ago, the pinnacle of combined entertainment DVD was watching the Sopranos. MP3 players, smartphones, and was a member of the Netflix was a small e-mail is based on the rental service is trying to compete with the likes of a professional. If someone had made, and how the entertainment industry appears to be 10 years later, and the huge role the technology concerned was I laughed at the sports model. This is entertainment in the future!

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