Re: flights outside of the coverage area
Posted: Tue Feb 21, 2012 8:12 am
Andrew,
Apologies for the delay with the creation of your account. I see the signup in the 3rd party billing system, but they haven't yet fired off the event which causes the account to be created in our system. Every now and then, we see a delay of a couple of hours. It's been 4 1/2hrs on this one so far, which is definitely one of the longest delays I've seen yet. I would certainly expect them to clear out their queue "any minute now." You and I will both receive an email once the process is complete, so if I don't see one in the next few hours, I'll see if we can get in touch with them to get an update. I doubt it will come to that, though...we've never had a new signup NOT get communicated to us from the billing system...but we have seen the occasional delay.
I'll ensure that your trial date is padded to allow for the inconvenience.
Regarding the coverage area, this is a tricky topic. I do see what you're saying, and I do agree that the current coverage area is not sufficient those who are looking for 45-60min jet airline ops. This post was written pre-launch, and at a time when I expected to have Oakland ARTCC coverage very shortly after the launch (something which has not transpired).
I will update the original post, removing the part which requests pilots to disconnect from the network for the portion of the flight which is outside of the coverage area when conducting a flight that starts or finishes within the coverage area.
We will have part-time Oakland coverage by the middle of March. This will increase our coverage area to a 600x400nm area, which should be sufficient for all sorts of airliner ops.
Question, do you envisage conducting a mix of flights that are entirely within the coverage area, and flights that are partially conducted within the coverage area? Or, do you intend on conducting a high volume of flights that are entirely outside of the coverage area?
If you take an example where 20 pilots conduct random flights on the network, all over the world, statistically they're unlikely to be within radio range of each other (unless it's a coordinated event). Their calls are going to be unheard by everyone else. The only difference between a flight like that and an offline flight is that their flight will get tracked on PEaware (our flight tracking application).
You might argue that it doesn't hurt PE and that it should be the pilots' choice. I'd say you'd be 90% right. It certainly is the paying pilots' choice as to where they fly. However, the overall value of the platform is diminished if the network's participants are randomly scattered all over the globe. If those pilots are willing to at least start or finish within the coverage area, then the overall value of the network is increased by their presence.
Once we're at a point where the concurrent usage is sufficiently high, I would retract the request to start/finish within the coverage area, since the network will already be in full swing as a useful platform (ie, we have traffic density within the coverage area). However, until we get to that point, pilots consistently flying outside of the coverage area are a 'wasted' opportunity in terms of building the network's value.
You could make the argument that as paying customers, it's not your concern about building the network's value, that's "our" problem to fix, not yours. I would certainly understand and respect that.
This is why all of this is phrased as a request to fly within certain areas, as opposed to a RULE or part of the terms of service. All I can do is explain the goal of the network and leave it in the hands of the users. As long as you've read this through, given it some thought, then I'll respect any decision that you make regarding your flights on the network. My point is, my hope is that this post would be read by someone who wasn't aware of the overall goal of the network and then alters their flights accordingly. If anyone reads this and says, "sure, but I still want to do my flights where I want most/all of the time," then I don't have any problem with it.
So, in short, I'll update the original post to reflect the fact that it's a request for pilots to fly within the coverage area, or at least start/finish in the coverage area, but certainly not a requirement or a rule. I'll just have to make sure that it's crystal clear to pilots where the ATC coverage area is (this is harder than you might think, and the presence of pilots all over the world on the network is going to make that a little bit harder, but I'll cope)
Thanks for the feedback. As I said in the original post, I was looking for direct feedback on this very topic.
Apologies for the delay with the creation of your account. I see the signup in the 3rd party billing system, but they haven't yet fired off the event which causes the account to be created in our system. Every now and then, we see a delay of a couple of hours. It's been 4 1/2hrs on this one so far, which is definitely one of the longest delays I've seen yet. I would certainly expect them to clear out their queue "any minute now." You and I will both receive an email once the process is complete, so if I don't see one in the next few hours, I'll see if we can get in touch with them to get an update. I doubt it will come to that, though...we've never had a new signup NOT get communicated to us from the billing system...but we have seen the occasional delay.
I'll ensure that your trial date is padded to allow for the inconvenience.
Regarding the coverage area, this is a tricky topic. I do see what you're saying, and I do agree that the current coverage area is not sufficient those who are looking for 45-60min jet airline ops. This post was written pre-launch, and at a time when I expected to have Oakland ARTCC coverage very shortly after the launch (something which has not transpired).
I will update the original post, removing the part which requests pilots to disconnect from the network for the portion of the flight which is outside of the coverage area when conducting a flight that starts or finishes within the coverage area.
We will have part-time Oakland coverage by the middle of March. This will increase our coverage area to a 600x400nm area, which should be sufficient for all sorts of airliner ops.
Question, do you envisage conducting a mix of flights that are entirely within the coverage area, and flights that are partially conducted within the coverage area? Or, do you intend on conducting a high volume of flights that are entirely outside of the coverage area?
If you take an example where 20 pilots conduct random flights on the network, all over the world, statistically they're unlikely to be within radio range of each other (unless it's a coordinated event). Their calls are going to be unheard by everyone else. The only difference between a flight like that and an offline flight is that their flight will get tracked on PEaware (our flight tracking application).
You might argue that it doesn't hurt PE and that it should be the pilots' choice. I'd say you'd be 90% right. It certainly is the paying pilots' choice as to where they fly. However, the overall value of the platform is diminished if the network's participants are randomly scattered all over the globe. If those pilots are willing to at least start or finish within the coverage area, then the overall value of the network is increased by their presence.
Once we're at a point where the concurrent usage is sufficiently high, I would retract the request to start/finish within the coverage area, since the network will already be in full swing as a useful platform (ie, we have traffic density within the coverage area). However, until we get to that point, pilots consistently flying outside of the coverage area are a 'wasted' opportunity in terms of building the network's value.
You could make the argument that as paying customers, it's not your concern about building the network's value, that's "our" problem to fix, not yours. I would certainly understand and respect that.
This is why all of this is phrased as a request to fly within certain areas, as opposed to a RULE or part of the terms of service. All I can do is explain the goal of the network and leave it in the hands of the users. As long as you've read this through, given it some thought, then I'll respect any decision that you make regarding your flights on the network. My point is, my hope is that this post would be read by someone who wasn't aware of the overall goal of the network and then alters their flights accordingly. If anyone reads this and says, "sure, but I still want to do my flights where I want most/all of the time," then I don't have any problem with it.
So, in short, I'll update the original post to reflect the fact that it's a request for pilots to fly within the coverage area, or at least start/finish in the coverage area, but certainly not a requirement or a rule. I'll just have to make sure that it's crystal clear to pilots where the ATC coverage area is (this is harder than you might think, and the presence of pilots all over the world on the network is going to make that a little bit harder, but I'll cope)
Thanks for the feedback. As I said in the original post, I was looking for direct feedback on this very topic.