Things in the Sky

A few days ago Virgin American launched its inflight Internet service, and the press released made me think of something that was mentioned in a press release from October about Elevate:

*Coming in 2009: Members also will be able to combine points and dollars to redeem on-line. Members will be able to tailor the in-flight experience by loading a favorite play-list or videogame avatar.

Hm…this seems like a very interesting to link-up Virgin America’s entertainment system, Red, and frequent flyer program, Elevate. So here are some things that I would love to see in the future in addition to what Virgin America said, though I have no idea how likely these ideas are.

1. Suggestions for music and movies based on prior purchases.
2. The ability to save video game progress at the end of one flight so a player can pick up from right where he or she left off on another plane and not have to start from scratch.
3. Elevate points for certain video game achievements, or maybe there could be competitions among Elevate members.
4. Saving entertainment purchases. For example, let’s say someone is flying SAN-SFO-JFK, and purchases a movie on the first leg. Wouldn’t it be cool if he or she could continue the movie on the next leg, and heck, even have it start from where he or she stopped watching?

Ok, so there are my pie-in-the-sky suggestions for the future. I’m looking forward to seeing what Virgin America does next year. Feel free to share any ideas you have in the comments.