Delta Inks Exclusive Pact With YouTube For In-Flight Viewing (variety.com)
- Reference: 0175854497
- News link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/01/09/0147249/delta-inks-exclusive-pact-with-youtube-for-in-flight-viewing
- Source link: https://variety.com/2025/biz/news/delta-youtube-inflight-viewing-1236269238/
> Delta executives announced the YouTube deal and other flight-experience enhancements to its Delta Sync platform as the aviation giant gave an expansive presentation Tuesday evening at the Sphere in Las Vegas, in connection with the Consumer Electronics Show. Delta touted plans to mark the company's 100th anniversary this year, noting that it is the first airline to reach the centennial mark.
>
> It's also no surprise that Delta is leaning hard into AI tech. The company hopes its Delta Concierge AI-powered personal assistant feature that is rolling out this year on its Fly Delta app will make strides in improving the overall customer experience. The goal is that with repeated use the Concierge tool will come to anticipate individual consumers' needs and help them streamline the logistics of travel -- or what Delta dubbed "contextualized guidance" on everything from departure gates to baggage claim details to alerting travelers to weather conditions at their destinations. [...]
>
> Mary Ellen Coe, chief business officer of YouTube, emphasized that the ad-free YouTube offering will allow viewers to access streaming content as well as podcasts and music. She also asserted that consumers are increasingly gathering travel tips and inspiration through YouTube creators. "Creators are producing the must-see TV of today," Coe said.
[1] https://variety.com/2025/biz/news/delta-youtube-inflight-viewing-1236269238/
[2] https://www.theverge.com/2025/1/7/24338411/delta-airplane-screen-4k-hdr-qled-uber-ces
how, precisely (Score:2)
... Will an AI "agent" mitigate:
- shitty microseats that seem to get smaller every year
- a boarding process that has been repeatedly mathematically proved to be the least efficient approach (5? different groups board ahead of "group 1" lol)
- shit food that now cattle class has to pay for
- don't even get me started on the microbial culture in your planes by the end of the day ... Because THOSE are the primary drivers of passenger misery, not imprecise knowledge of the weather at my destination or lack of acc
Re: (Score:2)
> shitty microseats that seem to get smaller
If you want more space, you can pay for it.
There's no reason to impose the cost of more legroom on small people who don't need it.
How many skymiles members on a plane? (Score:2)
Typical plane wifi can barely handle a bunch of people browsing the internet at once, what hope in hell does it have of running many parallel video streams.
Re: (Score:2)
> what hope in hell does it have of running many parallel video streams.
If the choices are constrained to a few thousand videos, they can be cached onboard.
A 10 TB HDD can cache 2,000 HD movies in 200 grams.
Delta's plan looks like it was designed to reduce off-plane traffic.
Re: (Score:2)
I give it a 0% chance they're offering streaming directly from YouTube. With a few terabytes of cache they could easily serve up thousands of hours of the content most likely to be watched.
Hmmm. (Score:2)
So, on Delta, every 15 minutes of film is followed by 5 seconds of ads?
Re: (Score:2)
> So, on Delta, every 15 minutes of film is followed by 5 seconds of ads?
I think that's Amazon Prime.
In flight viewing? (Score:2)
Wouldn't it be more useful to give you something to do while you are waiting for your delayed plane?
Re: (Score:3)
> Wouldn't it be more useful to give you something to do while you are waiting for your delayed plane?
Most airports have free WiFi.
Re: (Score:3)
I think they should basically open the bar in the first class lounges. As it is, half the passengers need to have a couple stiff drinks to even get on a 737. Hell with Boeing's safety record as of late it would be safer driving. I figure it's less likely that my tire falls off an axel, or a door magically disappears from my car. Of course, I might have a high velocity impact with a concrete wall, but apparently that only happens in South Korea.
Re: (Score:2)
Why would that be needed? How can you be bored in an airport. There's wifi, restaurants, lounges, heck I know this may be controversial in the age of 4 second attention spans, but take a book with you.