As seen on lockergnome.com

Many times on this blog I have stated that I believe the American Express Platinum Card is the best credit card for any frequent traveler. I use the numerous benefits of this card on a weekly basis. One of the most attractive benefits of the Platinum Card is the airport lounge access program. Up until today, Platinum Card members had access to the Delta Sky Club, Continental President’s Club, and the American Airlines Admirals Club. You could access these lounges, your day of travel, when you were flying the respective airline. That last sentence is key: “when flying the respective airline.” For example, you could not access the Detla Sky Club with your Platinum Card if you were flying Airtran Airlines even though they often share terminals.

Today, American Express announced that all Platinum and Centurion (black card) members will be able to access the US Airways Club! Better yet, unlike with the Delta, Continental, and American clubs, you DON’T have to be flying US Airways to access the lounge; you can be ticketed on any airline and still be granted complimentary access with your Platinum or Centurion card. This is a major travel benefit, and I am glad to see that American Express is adding more benefits to the Platinum and Centurion cards. which makes the annual fee easier to swallow during these economic times.

Follow me on Twitter for updates regarding the American Express Platinum card.

[As seen on MacSlice]

What better place to write your iPad review than at 35,000 feet using your iPad with inflight WiFi! The iPad makes for a great travel companion with GoGoInflight’s WiFi service, but I will talk more about that later. I have had the iPad for about a week now and I am absolutely floored at not only the features of this device, but more so the future potential of the iPad. Calling this just a large iPod Touch is absurd. The large screen real estate, speed, and portability of this device opens up whole new doors to application developers. Like with the evolution of the original iPhone, I can’t wait to see what this device is like two to three years from now.

The best way for me to sum up my review of the iPad is that it has replaced my MacBook Pro for casual browsing, entertainment, and e-mail. I have found myself not using my MacBook Pro when returning home from work unless I want a live stream on in the background. The iPad allows me much more flexibility when wanting to be online, like lounging in the lazy boy or laying on the couch (admit, you do it too). At the office I no longer have to disconnect my MacBook Pro to take it with me for staff meetings, I just grab my iPad and go.

I could list many more examples, and list the various technical aspects that I like, but you all get the picture. The iPad is not a killer device, but rather a device that is going to change the way we do portable and casual computing. I cannot wait for the OS 4 improvements that are coming this Fall, multitasking is much needed for this device to truly be an industry leader. Back to my earlier point, this device is an inflight computing dream and will do wonders for inflight entertainment (that is the travel geek in me).

Happy iPading

David Banther

*This post created entirely inside the Pages app on my iPad using the on screen keyboard!

Yes, that is what Southwest Airlines refers to large people as – “Customer of Size”. I think the term “Southwest Two Seater” is more appropriate (I place myself in this category). This past week a PR firestorm irrupted for Southwest Airlines when, through a series of events, a well known movie director was removed from a Southwest flight for being too large to fit into one seat (flight was full, no spare seats available). Needless to say he was not happy, and made it well known in real time via his Twitter account. You can read the news article here, Kevin Smith’s blog post about the incident here, and Southwest Airlines open apology here, you can be the judge.

I was obviously not there, and I do hold the position that if you do “spill over” into a second seat you should be forced to purchase a second seat, but I do believe (as I wrote in a past blog post) that Southwest Airlines is famous for arbitrarily picking out large customers and asking them to buy a second seat without letting them prove they can fit into one seat. The situation with Kevin Smith seems very shady (after reading statements from both sides), so I would place my bets that Southwest Airlines was just doing what they are becoming famous for: singling out large customers and making knee jerk decisions before examining all the facts.

Air France has joined other airlines in implementing an extra seat fee for “obese passengers”, according to a story in the UK Telegraph. I wrote a blog post on my travel blog “The Forward Cabin” that I believe passengers should be charged a fee only if they can prove that they can’t fit into one seat.

It appears, according to this article, that Air France agents will be making a judgement call and not give passengers the opportunity to prove that they can fit in one seat. I understand that there are some passengers that it would be obvious they cannot fit into one seat, but there are many passengers who would fall into that grey area and should be given the opportunity to prove they can fit into one seat. Thus, I do not think agents should be making arbitrary judgement calls on all passengers. What do you think?

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