Janne from ButtUgly blog has stated that surfing and talking to his loved one over a transatlantic flight is priceless, and thus 30 euros US dollars for 10 hours of Wifi is nothing. I dropped off my dad earlier this week to Parikkala, where he caught the train to Helsinki. He booked 1st class, so he could work on his stuff there, as he thought there were electric plugs offered – after all the 1st class is advertised for business men primarily.

First of all, there were no electric plugs in 1st class and the online reservation system did not allow us to book a seat with a place to plug your computer in, even if there were any. Secondly, how expensive would it be for VR (the railway company) to integrate WiFi on to the wagons? Do you think people would rather take the train to Helsinki, even if it took 5 hours if you can work on your normal day to day stuff during that trip, or pay triple and fly to Helsinki for one hour (plus all the trips to the airports and to the city)?

I’d argue that VR would have a real competitive way to steal passengers from airplanes to their trains by simply adding WiFi and marketing it a bit. But then again, there’s no competition for them (direct, anyways) so why should they improve service that much – being a monopoly is pretty good.

ps. I’m off to a friends wedding today – I’ll try and moblog some stuff from there, but don’t expect too much – I am after all in charge of the punch :)