Airlines already charge for blankets, legroom, food, and booze. Now one European carrier wants to expand those offerings to include porn. The chief of Irish discount airline Ryanair tells Britain's Sun that the company is considering offering titillating in-flight entertainment. The porn would be available via a Ryanair app for tablets and smartphones, which passengers could also use to gamble or play games. Does porn really have a place on crowded, irritant-packed airplanes?
This is a terrible idea: "If you thought sitting next to someone with a baby or a large person spilling over into your seat was bad, imagine spending hours on a plane next to someone drooling over pornography," says Mark Stachiew at Canada.com. Worse yet, imagine a young child sitting next to a porn watcher. Would there need to be an "adults-only" section on the plane? It's hard to imagine this idea really "taking off."
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C'mon, it wouldn't be so bad: "Hotels around the world have it, so why wouldn't we?" Ryanair chief Michael O'Leary tells The Sun. Besides, it would be fairly discreet. We'd offer porn on a handheld device, not "on screens on the back of seats for everyone to see." This could be done in a way that pleased porn enthusiasts without offending everyone else.
But you can already watch porn on a flight: "If adult content is available via a smartphone app, doesn't that mean that internet access will be required to use the app?" asks Tom Hymes at AVN. And if in-flight internet access is available, surely you could watch porn without Ryanair's pricey app. Alternatively, couldn't you simply load porn onto your iPad prior to takeoff? "What fool would actually prefer to pay the inevitable surcharge required to access Ryanporn?"
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