Airlines are increasingly stepping away from pricey in-flight entertainment systems in favor of streaming content to personal entertainment devices.
United calls its device streaming United Private Screening while Southwest offers live TV on passenger devices.
This has become especially feasible as in-flight Wi-Fi technologies have improved over the years, allowing airlines to consider the unthinkable: providing content directly to travelers without having to purchase, install and maintain seat-back hardware.
Now there's another way to grab content on the go before a flight or other extended journey: it's called Digiboo Zones, a product from on-demand content delivery company Digiboo. The brand currently has kiosks installed in various places through America (see the locations here), each of which allow users to access and download movies and other content.
The Zones product extends the functionality of these kiosks to allows users in the vicinity to download movies directly into the Digiboo app, where they can then be watched on the plane without a connection. The files come in at around 1GB and the company promises that the files download in only minutes.
It's hard to tell whether consumers will jump at this once the airlines offer their own streaming content to passenger devices. One thing that Digiboo has going for it is the selection — there's no choice as far as what will be available once a passenger boards the plane, so choosing in advance will appeal to those who want to watch a movie they actually prefer rather than having to compromise.
American airports that currently have kiosks include Houston, Cleveland, Indianapolis, Minneapolis, Knoxville, Portland and Seattle.
Here's a slightly amusing-in-its-seriousness video about how Digiboo Zones will work for travelers.