That’s one of the many bells and whistles Virgin is reportedly going to bring to its U.S. planes, according to Travel Mole. From the article:

• Enabling a traveler’s gadget-conscious lifestyles. Every seat on Virgin’s new airline will have a power plug for laptops and USB chargers for MP3 players, for example.

• Eliminate the hand signals and call button etiquette problem. Virgin America has an online ordering system where passengers can pay through a cashless system.

• Discounts without the discount airports. Other airlines have often out-of-the-way airports but Virgin is flying only from DC to Los Angeles and San Francisco, at least at first.

• Connecting with other passengers. Virgin has what it calls a “seat to seat” chat button built into every seat. Passengers can put their seats into “discoverable” modes to talk.

I’m liking this. I’m not sure if, as the article predicts, this will set a new bar for U.S. airlines, but anything’s possible.

In today’s installment, security expert Bruce Schneier interrogates TSA Administrator Kip Hawley on burning airline security issues, including shoes and scanners that allow screeners to see you sans clothing. The upshot? Don’t chuck those easy-to-remove travel shoes anytime soon.

BS: When can we keep our shoes on?

KH: Any time after you clear security. Sorry, Bruce, I don’t like it either, but this is not just something leftover from 2002. It is a real, current concern. We’re looking at shoe scanners and ways of using millimeter wave and/or backscatter to get there, but until the technology catches up to the risk, the shoes have to go in the bin.

BS: This feels so much like “cover your [expletive deleted&8212;ed.]” security: you’re screening our shoes because everyone knows Richard Reid hid explosives in them, and you’ll be raked over the coals if that particular plot ever happens again. But there are literally thousands of possible plots.

So when does it end?

This is priceless: Security expert Bruce Schneier interviews TSA Administrator Kip Hawley. And he asks some of the questions I’d like to ask, including:

Bruce Schneier: By today’s rules, I can carry on liquids in quantities of three ounces or less, unless they’re in larger bottles. But I can carry on multiple three-ounce bottles. Or a single larger bottle with a non-prescription medicine label, like contact lens fluid. It all has to fit inside a one-quart plastic bag, except for that large bottle of contact lens fluid. And if you confiscate my liquids, you’re going to toss them into a large pile right next to the screening station — which you would never do if anyone thought they were actually dangerous.

Can you please convince me there’s not an Office for Annoying Air Travelers making this sort of stuff up?

Kip Hawley: Screening ideas are indeed thought up by the Office for Annoying Air Travelers and vetted through the Directorate for Confusion and Complexity, and then we review them to insure that there are sufficient unintended irritating consequences so that the blogosphere is constantly fueled.

Then he takes his tongue out of his cheek and explains how TSA arrived at its current goo rules. No specifics, of course, due to security concerns, but Hawley gives it a good try. Be sure to tune in tomorrow (and the next several days after that)&8212;this is just the first in a five-part series.

Here’s a handy little site called Acronym Finder that helps you, well, find acronyms (thanks to the MeCo listserv for the pointer). It even lists both meetings-industry meanings for CMP!

According to some planners I’ve been e-chatting with, if association members are happy with their local chapter, they tend to be happy with the organization as a whole. So why, then, don’t more associations play up the chapter aspect in their annual meetings?

PCMA tends to do a really good job with this, IMHO, though it’s been a few years since I attended. But they had fun teambuilding sorts of events that pit the chapters against each other to do silly things like write a song about their area and perform it in front of everyone. I’ve also seen some “Jeopardy” type sessions that have representatives of the various chapters as contestants. The energy level goes through the roof, and people who may not have been active in their local chapter (such as moi) get to know people and want to do more with like-minded folks in their area.

Seems like everyone would benefit, especially if the chapter challenges were really fun and involving (if anyone has done anything interesting along these lines, please let me know. I’m looking for ideas we could use in a professional association I’m involved with!).

After all the commotion about the CNN/YouTube Democratic debate held recently, I can’t help but wonder if anyone is planning to use this type of format for their meeting, particularly association meetings. Imagine a bunch of questions from members being aired—say, at a panel, or a keynote—and being answered from the stage. Much more dynamic, not to mention easier to view than craning your neck to see who walked up to a mike in the aisle.

While most associations’ members probably wouldn’t upload a ton of videos to choose from, you could have someone with a camera roving the halls, or designate an area where people can come and tape their questions or comments. Your staff could easily upload them to YouTube. You could also do a talent contest that way and have people vote with automated response systems at general sessions…the possibilities are endless, really. And it’d be a good way to get those who couldn’t make the conference involved.

It could, as it did for the Democratic debate, breathe some fresh air into something that historically is a little canned and stuffy. I’d love to see this done!

Having once paid almost double what it cost me to fly from Boston to LA for a Boston-New York trip, I’ve always wondered what bizarre rituals the powers-that-be at the airlines must go through to set their ticket prices. Something to do with chicken bones, an old soup can, and a pair of dice, perhaps? Thankfully, an MIT grad took on the challenge, as explained in this article in Wired. With diagrams, no less.

But, no matter how much you study the deals on Orbitz et al, remember this (from the article):

The system is so complex that the problem of finding the cheapest airfare between two cities is considered mathematically unfathomable. According to a paper from the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics provided by ITA, “the problem of finding the cheapest airfare from point A to point B is unsolvable.”

Just imagine having Barbra Streisand on your VIP list. According to This is London, she is very particular about what she wants from a hotel:

Peach-coloured toilet roll to match her complexion, and rose petals in the toilet bowl. One hundred-and-twenty designer bathroom towels also in peach. Ten highly specified designer floor lamps.

And that’s before we get to the insistence that the security team wear ‘neat dark sweaters’ and use metal detectors.

(Via Hotel Chatter.)

More airline safety news: If you’re in a plane crash, you’ll most likely survive if you’re in the tail section of the plane, according to Popular Mechanics. I’d still rather sit up front, say, in the first class section, even if the odds of surviving are 20 percent worse from front to back. After all, the article points out:

And once your seatbelt is firmly fastened, relax: There’s been just one fatal jet crash in the U.S. in the last five-plus years.

It sounds like the authorities finally figured out what we have known all along: that confiscating lighters on flights is nothing more than “security theater,” as TSA chief Kip Hawley now admits in an article in today’s New York Times (here’s a link to the MSNBC takeoff on that article, for those who don’t subscribe to the Times).

By lifting the ban, Mr. Hawley said, security officers could spend more time looking for bombs or bomb parts. “The No. 1 threat for us is someone trying to bring bomb components through the security check point,” he said. “We don’t want anything that distracts concentration from searching for that.”

The goo rules are still in effect, though, and it sounds like we still have to take off our shoes. So security theater still rules, unfortunately. It was heartening to read that

In the coming months, the agency will install new equipment intended to improve its ability to intercept explosives. The new equipment will include advanced X-ray machines that rapidly examine carry-on bags from many angles, making it easier to identify bomb components, and hand-held devices that can determine whether a liquid might be explosive.

Now that might actually make us a little safer.