The problem with digital cellphone service in the air, is that it has too short of range to reach the antenna towers on the ground. The HHF radios in phones are only a few hundred milliwatts at 2 or 2.5gHz, which is about enough power in that frequency range to go a mile or 2 reliably, and planes cruise at 6 miles or higher. Analog phones did have a much longer range, and they were on a much lower band (about 900mHz). I remember my old Motorola flip-phone working on a flight in the early 90s, but never any digital phones. So the bottom line is that the plane would need an interface to convert cellphone signals from plane passengers into a satellite signal to be relayed via satellite back to the ground, or a VHF radio signal, which would take up TONS of bandwidth, and then it would get relayed to another VHF radio on the ground, and from there, re-relayed to a cell tower. And even THINKING of that, is the ultimate e-Clusterf**k. I don't know what the paid services do, but it would have to be something like what I said.
Charles
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