David J.
Danto
Business travel
thoughts in my own, personal opinion
eMail: ddanto@IMCCA.org Follow Industry News: @NJDavidD
NOT Traveling Blog, 2nd
Week Of July
In 2014 I was voted
by USA Today readers as one of the top ten business travel bloggers in the
USA. Now mind you,
I turned out to be number ten on the list of ten, but I did make it on (with my
thanks to all those who voted.) Now
that we’re all stuck at home and not traveling, I had to think about what to do
with my blogs. I could stop writing them
entirely – waiting till we all get through the current COVID19 pandemic /
crisis. I could wax nostalgic and/or
complain about past trips. Or, I could
focus all of my efforts on my day job – growing the use of collaboration
technologies – especially in light of how many people are now forced to use
those tools for the first time. In
reflecting upon those choices, what I decided to do is compile an ongoing list
of observations during the crisis. Some
of these may amuse, some may inform, some may sadden and others may help. My goal will be for you to have seen
something in a different light than you did before you stopped to read the
blog. I was going to apologize for how
disjointed these thoughts may seem when put together, but then it dawned on me
that feeling disjointed is our new normal – at least for a little while.
As I write this the July 4th / US Independence day holiday weekend is approaching. (I write these blogs in advance for the following week.) In past years I’ve almost always traveled
over this holiday – to Vegas to watch the fireworks on the strip…to the Jersey
Shore to enjoy the activities…to many other quiet or bustling destinations. Not this year. COVID19 has limited the things that are even
open, and those available choices are not safe enough in my opinion. My family and I will be home, continuing to
do work around the house, watching TV, listening to music and counting our
blessings, fully aware that many others are having a much, much worse
experience of the pandemic than we are.
If being bored is the worst thing that happens to us during this crisis
then we’re very lucky. I won’t do things
that are risky just because I’m stir-crazy.
That would make me just plain crazy – and that’s what many Covidiots are.
Speaking of crazy Covidiots, the US
airline industry has decided that it’s appropriate for them to fill their
aircrafts to capacity now. Is there a
legitimate reason for this? No, the virus still has no vaccine; no, keeping
some social-distance from other people is still part of the CDC guidelines; no,
the occurrence of the virus has not diminished in the US (it is in fact at the
highest peak we’ve ever seen.) Then the explanation
for packing people into airplanes like sardines is purely greed – the raison d'etre
of the entire airline industry. They’ve
claimed that their precautions are more than enough to ensure the safety of
their passengers, despite members of congress and Dr. Fauci
shaking their heads at the decision.
If this is a surprise to you then you’ve not been paying attention to
this industry for very long. I don’t
believe a single thing told to me by US airline management and their industry
association. If you want to convince me
that flying in the center seats of a packed airplane for 3-6 hours with only a
cloth mask to protect you is actually safe then I’d need to see video of
airline CEO’s doing it. I know they have
the people and technology to make such a video – here’s a video of United’s CEO walking
through an airport explaining the value of a mask. Keep rolling next time. Let me see him (and his family) board and fly
on one of his packed airplanes in the center seats. If he or his peers don’t do that you can bet
your house that they’re just lying again.
As I’ve said over and over in these not traveling blogs,
we’re not near the end of this crisis in the US, and we’re not even at the end
of the beginning. As I write this, the
number of new US cases in one day peaked over 50K for the first time. What this means is that all the suffering we
did to lock-down the country starting in March was totally and completely
wasted by states that opened-up too early.
Having individual states set their own guidelines was as dumb as it
would be if each state had to raise their own army to fight in a war. The crisis required national guidelines and
strong national leadership – something that we definitely don’t have right now. Or, to put it more simply – as it is being
explained in internet memes:
This weekend you will be able to watch a movie of the Broadway
production of Hamilton on the Disney+ service. This was another film that was intended for
theatrical release that instead went direct to home viewing because of the
pandemic. You can expect this to happen
more and more in the future. The
economic model of movie theaters is failing.
When the experience can be duplicated at home with modern, large, HD
screens and surround sound systems the theaters will need to vastly improve the
movie going experience to stay in business in the future. $$ seats, $$ popcorn and shrinking screens
will not cut it in the future. I hope an
improved experience is something the industry is working on, because if it’s
not then they’re in big trouble.
Speaking of direct-to-home video, HBO recently launched its
new streaming service HBO-Max. It has
all of HBO’s content as well as some original programming and exclusive access
to classic shows (such as The Big Bang Theory, Friends and more.) The
good news is if you subscribe to HBO on cable-TV you probably can get HBO-Max
for free. The bad news is that you can’t
get it on Amazon Fire or Roku – which represents more than 70% of streaming
content viewers. HBO has not yet
made distribution agreements with those two giants. Also in the bad news category, HBO is doing
away with their HBO-Go service (that is
available on Amazon and Roku) at the end of July. If you want access to this content you can
either watch it on a PC, or do what I did and permanently connect a PC to your
TV / home entertainment center. There
are just too many internet delivered programs, Zoom calls, YouTube events and
other things to not have a computer available to your TV going forward. Still, I’m keeping my fingers crossed that
HBO will eventually make deals with Amazon and Roku to resolve this issue.
As always, please feel free to write to me with comments or
items I should add to a future Not Traveling blog (or if you just need someone
to write to.) Stay safe, be well, hug
those you’re sheltering with (but no one else) and do your best to stay
positive. We’re going to be in this for
a long while.
This article was written by David Danto and contains solely his own, personal
opinions.
All image and links provided above as reference under
prevailing fair use statutes.