What would be fun is if planes formed their own 'Iridium' style network, communicating with the planes in front and behind them on their flight corridor, with a

What would be fun is if planes formed their own 'Iridium' style network, communicating with the planes in front and behind them on their flight corridor, with airports as base stations. Only data need be carried (no voice) as who really wants people yapping away on a plane? The transmitter on the plane would need to assume a plane roughly 100 miles or so in front, it would be roughly pointing in the right direction so the inverse square would apply to that, rather than the deal with the satellite where the 'bird' is 20000 or so miles away, at some angle above the equator, that has to be pointed at with some complicated servo arrangement. The TTL should be improved with an ad-hoc above the clouds network too.