David J. Danto
Principal
Consultant, Collaboration/ AV / Multimedia / Video / UC
Dimension Data
Director of
Emerging Technology
Interactive
Multimedia & Collaborative Communications Alliance
eMail:
David.Danto@DimensionData.com 
Follow Video &
Technology Industry News: @NJDavidD
(Read David’s Bio) (See
David’s CV) (Read David’s Other Blogs & Articles)
CES 201-IV – The Voyage Home
There have been stories in the news this week about how
Microsoft Windows 8 is being recognized as a dud. First, Microsoft let it sneak out that that as
of April they’re really going to start focusing on Windows 9. Then, over this past weekend, HP began a campaign
to bring back Windows 7 “By Popular Demand.” All of this was (of course) predicted by me
in my humorous
2013 predictions over a year ago. I
made the point in that blog – which many have made before and since
– that Microsoft operating systems are like Star Trek movies - only every other
one is any good.
In light of that, The Voyage Home seemed to be an
appropriate topic to share this week as the final punctuation to my 2014 CES report of a
couple of weeks ago. CES is what I was doing
when most of the rest of the US was dealing with the Polar
Vortex issues. Firstly, I was
incredibly lucky on my way to CES in getting out of EWR Saturday night January
4th without any significant delays.
Most of the rest of the flights from east to west had major issues all that
week. I was also very worried about
getting home that Thursday afternoon near the end of the conference for a
number of reasons:
o
The worst security delays ever experienced at Las
Vegas McCarran airport were during the CES getaway in the early 2000s. Passenger lines that wrapped around the
upstairs aisles and 4+ hour waits were very common.
o
United (need I say more)
o
TSA (need I say more)
o
The US air travel system was still in recovery from
all the week’s Irrops
As it turned out though, most of my
return trip home was OK.
Step one was returning the rental
car. I gained lots of respect and have major
kudos for National Car rental. They were
bringing in huge amounts of cars very rapidly and with smiles. It was the best I’ve ever seen during heavy
returns. I normally use other firms for
car rentals but my employer recently switched to National. If this is typical of how they operate I’m glad
they did. I was very surprised and
pleased.
Step two was checking a bag. Mind you, I absolutely don’t check bags when
traveling on business. I can give you
hundreds of reasons why it is never a good idea. Just about the only time I’m forced to do so
is when returning from CES. I pick-up
lots of technology demo items and product literature and I can’t manage squeezing
them all into my carry-ons. Amazingly there
were NO LINES at United’s T3 counters for bag check. Not a single person was waiting, not even for
coach. It was a very pleasant surprise here
as well.
Step three was security – and you
just knew I’d never be able to hold the winning streak leaving Las Vegas. The TSA was the streak-breaker here, as their
agents seem to be the epitome of the quote “if all you have is a hammer,
everything looks like a nail.” The agents wanted to inspect my carry-on
because of all the technology in it.
Here we go again - with TSA agents going rogue on the rules of Pre-Check. I’m the same pre-cleared, Global Entry, fully
investigated guy that flies all the time.
Why they think they need to check my bag this time as opposed to any of
the others is incomprehensible. This was
a full check – as in take out your PC, unpack the sundries, etc. - not a random
sniffer test that I’ve had many times before.
As I travel using Pre-Check (which is a stunningly great idea by the way)
I find the TSA agents are frequently just making up rules as they go. In just the last six weeks I’ve seen agents
say “they’ll staff the Pre-Check lane when they feel like it” (Phoenix); say
that Pre-Check means “you can leave on your belt and shoes but that’s the only
difference” (also Phoenix); and say that if you have any electronics “more than
one PC they all have to come out” (Newark.)
On this particular trip the rules they made up that day took me an extra
25 minutes. It was a good thing I
arrived at the airport early.
Step four was boarding. As a United Premier Platinum (who carries a
luggage tag saying “Ex-Over-Entitled 1K” by the way) I was 50th (and
eventually 55th) on the upgrade list for the 12 seats in first. That’s some benefit.
To say there were a number of
frequent travelers on the flight would clearly be an understatement. Of course, the STUPID gate agents treated us
all like cattle, trying to stop a woman from bringing a third bag on board that
contained a service dog, and hassling me - despite being in group 1 - because
they didn’t like the size of my carry on (that has traversed the globe hundreds
of times.) Has anyone else noticed the
new, tiny luggage sizers United now uses?
I’ve been hassled by agents more in the last six weeks than in the last
three years. If you’re wondering why
United made them smaller (much smaller actually than the actual room in the
overhead by the way) I can give you six-billion
reasons why. The fees United and the
other airlines are charging passengers for services like checking bags are a
cash cow for them. Of course they want people
to think they have to check their bag because it doesn’t fit. Of course these sizers are pre-security in
many airports. What I really want to do
is make a wager with the next agent that tries to stop me – If I can’t get my
bag into the overhead bin in a standard wheels-first position I’ll give them a
thousand dollars, but if I can fit it easily they have to give me a thousand
dollars. How many agents would really
hassle frequent travelers if they knew they would be personally responsible
when they are wrong? As for this trip, I
talked my way past the agent and on to the plane. Of course my bag fit wheels-first as it
should and always does.
The topper of this voyage home was
the seats. I had been really looking
forward to a flight home on a legacy United A-320 bird and not a legacy Continental
long and narrow 737-kazillion. It was the
scheduled A-320, but with the seats replaced with the all-new super thin ones -
my first experience with this latest “making the pizza too cheap” experiment.
Honestly, I was surprised to find
after all I heard about them that the seats were not nearly as uncomfortable as
they’ve been made out to be. But the
seatback storage however is totally un-functional. As you can see in the collage above I could
barely squeeze a water bottle into the mesh section below, and the section
above that sits behind the tray table is completely useless. Where do I put my iPad? Where do I put my headphones or anything else
I need handy? As small a thing as it might
seem to be, it made the flight tremendously uncomfortable for many of us seasoned
travelers, with homeless bottles and work devices now placed on the floor,
being kicked around all the time and rolling throughout the cabin.
It dawned on me that an aftermarket
pouch could be designed that hooks onto either the mesh or the upper section
with two hooks and could serve the functions of the traditional seatback
pocket. Once I got home I looked for one
on Amazon without success so I made one out of a thin CES swag bag and a few 99
cent clips:
I haven’t had the chance to use this
yet but it is now a permanent addition to my flight briefcase. For this voyage home though all I could do
was use a standard plastic grocery bag by looping the handles up under the bar
and hooking them on the tray table clip.
It helped but it was hard to differentiate storage from garbage. I can’t wait to try the new invention.
After boarding this flight we were
stuck on the ground for about an hour before taking-off. The pilot explained that United recently
changed their computer platform (again?) and all the flights were having hard
times getting them to work. They got
through the issues but needed to re-open the doors so that maintenance could
come back on and certify the fix. So,
after waiting out the clear mechanical delay, how did the liars at United list
the status?
Of course, we were sitting on a
plane with a malfunctioning computer for about an hour – what else would it be
logged and filed as but a late incoming?
When we got to EWR it was “CO dba UA” business as usual. The checked bags took an hour to come out onto
the carousel, and the “priority” tags were nowhere to be seen for the first
fifteen minutes.
All in all this was just another
trip in the life of a Newark hub captive.
I didn’t actually get home from my scheduled 12:26 landing until after
2:30am (and I live ten minutes from the airport.)
Once this Voyage Home was over I found myself at the Final Frontier with the new United.
I reached Million Miler status on these flights – which now actually only
means Premier Gold for life. I don’t
have any intention of continuing to give the current management team at United
any “loyalty based business” considering the treatment 1Ks and Platinums
receive. So while I’ll fly United when I
have to, I’m off to the Undiscovered Country
of which ever airline has the lowest cost and best schedule / routing on each
individual trip I take. Future Generations may once again be loyal to
United if their employees or Board of Directors stage an Insurrection and remove the clueless and arrogant management. For now however, the Nemesis of the Newark hub captive is still how everything is all Jeffed-up.
(With my apologies for all the Star Trek movie
references.)
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This
article was written by David Danto and contains solely his own,
personal opinions. David has over three decades of experience providing problem
solving leadership and innovation in media and unified communications
technologies for various firms in the corporate, broadcasting and academic
worlds including AT&T, Bloomberg LP, FNN, Morgan Stanley, NYU, Lehman
Brothers and JP Morgan Chase. He now works with Dimension Data as their Principal
Consultant for the collaboration, multimedia, video and AV disciplines. He is
also the IMCCA’s Director of
Emerging Technology. David can be reached at David.Danto@Dimensiondata.com
or DDanto@imcca.org and his full bio and
other blogs and articles can be seen at Danto.info. Please reach-out to David if you would like
to discuss how he can help your organization solve problems or develop a
future-proof collaboration strategy.
All images and links provided above as reference under
prevailing fair use statutes.