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Stuff You Should Know

Short Stuff: In-Flight Entertainment

11 Mar 2026

Transcription

Chapter 1: What changes have occurred in in-flight entertainment over the years?

0.031 - 3.537 Unknown

This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed human.

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4.579 - 23.372 Questlove

Good people, what's up, what's up? It's Questlove. So recently I had the incredible opportunity to have a real conversation with actress and producer Jamie Lee Curtis from Routines to Recovery, True Lies, and a certain Jermaine Jackson music video. Jamie's real and raw, and it's something I really admire about her.

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23.487 - 44.719 Unknown

I am so happy that I'm the head in charge at 67, that I have the perspective that I have at my age to really be able to put all of this into context. Listen to The Questlove Show on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

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45.509 - 59.102 Bailey Taylor

I'm Bailey Taylor, and this is It Girl. This podcast is all about going deeper with the women's shaping culture right now. Yes, we will talk about the style and the success, but we are also talking about the pressure, the expectations, and the real work behind it all.

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59.503 - 70.774 Unknown

As a woman in the industry, you're always underestimated. So you have to work extra hard in a way that doesn't compromise who you are and your integrity. You know, I like to say I was kind of like a silent ninja.

70.754 - 78.003 Bailey Taylor

Listen to It Girl with Bailey Taylor on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Chapter 2: How did in-flight movies start and evolve?

81.768 - 94.585 Josh

Hey, and welcome to the short stuff. I'm Josh, and there's Chuck, and Jerry's here sitting in for Dave. And this is short stuff about in-flight movies, all the great stuff that you can watch when you fly with your favorite airline.

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95.898 - 118.969 Chuck

Yeah. And this is something that if you've been flying for a number of years has changed quite a bit. Yeah. I do remember the old days where I didn't fly a lot growing up at all. Like I think I flew one time before I went to college and then not even a lot after that because I was always broke. But I did go on a couple of flights back in the day where they had the one movie being shown. Yeah.

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118.949 - 133.093 Chuck

for the entire plane. And there were these big, huge, like Volkswagen Beetle size monitors that dropped down from the ceiling, like every 10 rows right in the middle. And maybe 30% of the flight could get a good angle on that screen.

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133.36 - 141.37 Josh

Yeah. And if you were lucky, you were close to that one big screen version that was like broadcast or shown on like the wall.

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Chapter 3: What challenges do airlines face with in-flight movie licensing?

141.791 - 142.292 Chuck

Oh, yeah. Yeah.

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142.652 - 152.285 Josh

In the middle rows. Yeah. That was how we used to watch movies. Everyone watched the same movie at the same time. You plugged in your headphones that were like hydraulics, if I remember correctly.

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152.305 - 152.665 Chuck

Yeah. Yeah.

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152.785 - 153.306 Josh

Air travel.

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153.346 - 154.828 Chuck

It's like just do a tube.

155.011 - 170.095 Josh

Yeah, and you watch that same movie. And because there's all sorts of different people with all sorts of different tastes, the movie you saw was radically different from the movie that you would find at your video store.

170.776 - 172.454 Chuck

Yes. For sure.

Chapter 4: How do airlines determine which movies to show on flights?

173.015 - 199.571 Chuck

One movie, whole plane. We will tell you the very first in-flight movie, believe it or not, was in 1929. It was a newsreel and a couple of cartoons on a transcontinental air transport flight. But real deal movie service started in the early 60s. This comes from Variety and CNN and How Stuff Works. But Nowadays, it's a whole different deal because we have broadband connections.

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199.631 - 219.792 Chuck

We have servers on board. Everyone knows now you can stream like over 100 movies probably. Even a couple of decades ago, you probably just had 10 or 15 movies you could watch because they were just stored on a hard drive, I guess. Right. But now they have all kinds of movies. You can play games against passengers. You can read e-books, listen to podcasts or music or whatever.

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219.832 - 225.197 Chuck

Right there, either on the seat back screen or on your laptop or tablet or whatever.

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Chapter 5: What are the differences in movie content based on cultural sensitivities?

225.852 - 241.937 Josh

Yeah, it is quite a time to be alive for that. But I guess the whole problem, the whole issue that faced airlines back in the day, which was how can you show a movie to a bunch of different people, is still around in different forms.

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242.744 - 257.3 Chuck

Yeah, for sure. I mean, it costs them a ton of money. Apparently, some airlines spend like $20 million per year just on licensing the content. Then you got to outfit the planes. That can cost about $5 million per aircraft. And it makes it a lot heavier.

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257.4 - 272.397 Chuck

So there was a guy, an econ professor in Norway, that basically calculated all the weight and everything and said, if airlines got rid of this stuff, they can save about $3 million per year per aircraft by not having this on board.

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272.933 - 278.323 Josh

Right. Which, I mean, they're like, well, so what? We make so much more than that.

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278.343 - 280.847 Chuck

Yeah, but they'd pass along the savings to us, I'm sure.

280.887 - 281.889 Josh

For sure.

282.029 - 282.631 Chuck

Yeah, of course.

Chapter 6: How do airlines edit movies for in-flight viewing?

283.332 - 302.978 Josh

Apparently, depending on where you are, I think in the United States, you pay something like 90 grand for one movie for a couple of months. Yeah, for license. And then other licenses are like by a per view. So every time somebody watches a movie, you have to pay a certain amount, probably not 90 grand.

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303.338 - 313.787 Josh

But still, like there's all sorts of different ways that airlines have to kind of dig in their pockets to make sure you have all the movies you want. So feel bad for the airlines.

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314.068 - 333.406 Chuck

Yeah. I don't know if this is for everybody, but I even call them airplane movies. It's sort of like a hotel movie. It's a movie that I probably wouldn't pay for or go see in a theater, but I will totally get like had enough interest to watch it. I will do that on airplanes almost 100% of the time. I won't watch either that or like an old favorite.

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333.907 - 344.457 Chuck

But I watched F1, the Brad Pitt Formula One movie on this last flight recently. And it was okay. It was an airplane movie.

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Chapter 7: What are the implications of showing edited versus unedited films?

344.477 - 347.4 Josh

Too much minimalist like office stuff for me.

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348.421 - 349.482 Chuck

Oh, yeah, yeah.

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349.715 - 353.397 Josh

I mean, it was lousy with that. I was watching it over somebody's shoulder.

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353.444 - 376.405 Chuck

Yeah. Yeah, there was a lot of that. I mean, the racing stuff was really, really great. I'm sure, obviously, much better on a big screen. But it was one of those where, like, not most, but a lot of people don't understand Formula One racing. So the entire time, like, the race commentary was so explanatory. Like, and now he has to go do this because that means this because the rules say this.

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376.685 - 381.95 Chuck

And it's just incessant. And it helped you understand it, but it was really pretty bad.

382.17 - 382.27

Yeah.

382.25 - 383.112 Chuck

Like Inception?

Chapter 8: What future trends can we expect in in-flight entertainment?

383.272 - 384.916 Chuck

In that respect. Yeah, like Inception.

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386.018 - 392.612 Josh

Let's take a little break and we'll come back and we'll talk about some of the stuff that airlines have to do to make sure that no one gets offended by their movies.

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392.973 - 394.015 Chuck

All right. We'll be right back.

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411.055 - 435.356 Lily Herman

Why hasn't a woman formally participated in a Formula One race weekend in over a decade? Think about how many skills they have to develop at such a young age. What can we learn from all of the new F1 romance novels suddenly popping up every year? He still smelled of podium champagne and expensive frictions. And how did a 2023 event called Wagageddon change the paddock forever?

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435.777 - 450.647 Lily Herman

That day is just seared into my memory. I'm culture writer and F1 expert Lily Herman, and these are just a few of the questions I'm tackling on No Grip, a Formula One culture podcast that dives into the underexplored pockets of the sport.

450.627 - 474.508 Lily Herman

In each episode, a different guest and I will go deeper into the wacky mishaps, scandals, and sagas, both on the track and far away from it, that have made F1 a delightful, decadent dumpster fire for more than 75 years. Listen to No Grip on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

476.547 - 494.961 Bailey Taylor

I'm Bailey Taylor, and this is It Girl. You may know me from my It Girl series I've done on the streets of New York over the years. Well, I've got good news. I am bringing those interviews and many more to this podcast. Yes, we will talk about the style and the success, but we are also talking about the pressure, the expectations, and the real work with the women shaping culture right now.

494.941 - 508.225 Unknown

As a woman in the industry, you're always underestimated. So you have to work extra hard and you have to push the narrative in a way that doesn't compromise who you are and your integrity. You know, I like to say I was kind of like a silent ninja.

508.255 - 521.648 Bailey Taylor

Each week, I have unfiltered conversations with female founders, creatives, and leaders to talk about ambition, visibility, and what it really takes to build something meaningful in the public eye. Because being an It Girl isn't about the spotlight. It's about owning it.

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