Alaska Airlines is beta-testing free access to
Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp and iMessage on Wi-Fi-equipped flights and expects
to deploy it fully on Jan. 24. Passengers will access the service via their
Gogo accounts. Alaska is the first carrier to enable free access to the
messaging services; elsewhere, passengers have to pay for Wi-Fi to access them.
Alaska will evaluate passenger response to determine whether to expand the
service to Horizon Air flights and to flights operated by Virgin America, which
it acquired
in December.