In today's Boing Boing Video episode: our mini-documentary of "Day in the Cloud," a mile-high frag-a-thon aboard two dueling Virgin America planes both eqipped with in-flight WiFi.
During the one-hour flights, bloggers and game dorks played games that required internet connections, to compete for netbooks and pure ultimate leetness over their foes.
Competing on the plane from Los Angeles to San Francisco (named "YouTube Air"): me (Xeni), Rob Beschizza from Boing Boing Gadgets, legendary internet hilarity farmer Ze Frank, web personality Shira Lazar, and Wei-Hwa Huang, former Googler and world puzzle champion.
On the plane from San Francisco to Los Angeles (named "Superfly"): Kid Beyond, singer, beatboxer, and game nerd.
Lessons learned: Google makes it easier to cheat. Absinthe makes it harder to win. WiFi makes flying less boring. Kid Beyond and Ze Frank are very funny. Wei-Hwa Huang is the guy you want on your team in a puzzle competition. And finally, Rob and I should stick to blogging/vlogging, and forget about competitive puzzle-solving.
Photos and more about the fragathon after the jump.
Where to Find Boing Boing Video: boingboingvideo.com, and on-board Virgin America planes.
RSS feed for new episodes here, YouTube channel here, subscribe on iTunes here. Get Twitter updates every time there's a new ep by following @boingboingvideo. (Disclosure: Virgin American provided free travel services for Boing Boing Video crew and on-camera guests, and covered some production costs associated with this episode. Special thanks to Eddie Codel).
Sponsor shout-out: This week's Boing Boing Video episodes are brought to you in part by WEPC.com, in partnership with Intel and Asus. WePC.com is a site where users come together to "share ideas, images and inspiration about the ideal PC." Participants' designs, feature ideas and community feedback will be evaluated by ASUS and "will influence the blueprint for an actual notebook PC built by ASUS with Intel inside."
- BB Video: Day in the Cloud - Google + Virgin America + Boing Boing ...
- An hour with Virgin's in-flight WiFi
- Virgin America announces in-flight, air-to-ground broadband ...
- Make Your Home Glow Like a Virgin-Atlantic Flight - Boing Boing ...
- Virgin America: Now, with Absinthe. - Boing Boing
- Boing Boing tv: now you can watch it on Virgin America. - Boing Boing
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For the sake of the fellow in the above image maybe you should change the title to "Mile high gaming with virgin AIRLINES"
done!
lol. my thoughts exactly.
leave it!
Two planes full of gamers doing what they could do on the ground. Increased air traffic speeds up climate damage. Don't encourage.
#4: thank you.
i'm kind of speechless.
Wow, you can almost read the text on my shirt in that video!
Xeni is too humble to mention that she had the critical insight on the only puzzle I was stuck on, making her an instrumental part of our flight's victory.
For more sordid details, read my blog. (And for a light web search puzzle of your own, *find* my blog.)
-- Wei-Hwa
#4 and #5,
the planes also contained paying fare passengers, it was a normal commercial flight, not something scheduled solely for this experiment.
@Wei-Hwa, HAH! I am too honest to try and cop that one, I just shouted what Ze Frank had said quietly behind me. I think my brain snapped the same thought silently at about the same time his did, but in fairness, but he said it first! :)
You are a rock star, Wei-Hwa, and it was great meeting you! I'll look for your blog, and please send us some fun stuff for Boing Boing sometime when you think of it!
XJ
#6
More importantly, did you win in Le Havre?
I am obsessed with that game now...
Myself being sooo new to the computer world I thought this video was 'Fantastically' entertaining as well as informative for those of us looking for a search engine that is knowledgeable as well as trusted. I usually only hear of 'Google' but know nothing about it really.
Thanx for the giggles, Constance
Constance, that makes you a Google Virgin!
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