I haven’t flown on a plane since I was 14 years old so I don’t really have any first hand experience with how bad the whole flying experience has gotten but given the ongoing Twitter noise it sure seems that the last thing that a lot of people want to be doing these days is climbing into an airplane to go somewhere.

With that as a backdrop it is a pleasure to be able to write about an airline that apparently has a hilarious sense of humor and strives to set itself apart from the rest of their cut-rate competitors in at least one way.

The airline is Kulula Airlines out of South Africa, which means most of us will probably never be able to enjoy flying on one of their planes, and their sense of humor is evident from the moment you see one of their planes and carries through to the interaction with the flight staff.

To give you an example here are some actual comments that have been heard over the PA system on Kulula flights.

“Thank you for flying Kulula. We hope you enjoyed giving us the business as much as we enjoyed taking you for a ride.”

And from the pilot during his welcome message: “Kulula Airlines is pleased to announce that we have some of the best flight attendants in the industry. Unfortunately, none of them are on this flight!”

After an extremely hard landing, the Flight Attendant said, “Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to The Mother City. Please remain in your seats with your seat belts fastened while the captain taxis what’s left of our airplane to the gate!”

Part of a flight attendant’s arrival announcement: “We’d like to thank you folks for flying with us today. And, the next time you get the insane urge to go blasting through the skies in a pressurized metal tube, we hope you’ll think of Kulula Airways.”

“Ladies and gentlemen, if you wish to smoke, the smoking section on this airplane is on the wing. If you can light ‘em, you can smoke ‘em.”

The interesting thing is that this isn’t a part of some clever marketing spin but rather it is who the company is – a company that doesn’t take themselves seriously and built around having fun.

Too bad more companies care as much about making sure their customers were enjoying themselves even if it involves poking fun at the company’s expense.

via Fast Company

An airline with a hilarious sense of humor – what a switch is a post from: The Inquisitr

Nintendo just revealed a North American release date of  May 23rd for the sequel to Super Mario Galaxy at its San Francisco Media Summit, where it also announced a U.S. launch date for the Nintendo DSi XL.

They also showed off a new trailer for the game, and it’s fair to say this has potential ‘Game of the Year’ written right through it, like a stick of Blackpool rock. There is not a single second of this video where I didn’t want to play as Nintendo’s famous plumber myself. Check out the drill power-up!

Excuse my drooling fanboy tone, but yet again it looks like we’re getting another stupendous platformer:

[VIDEO] Super Mario Galaxy 2 gets launch date, amazing new trailer is a post from: The Inquisitr

[NOTE: Nobody likes a Mr. Blabbermouth McSpoiler, so I'm going to say right here that this post contains huge, Donkey Kong-sized spoilers. If you're buying New Super Mario Bros. Wii and don't wish to watch its rather epic ending, now's the time to stop reading.]

I’ve made no secret on here of my love for New Super Mario Bros. Wii, so how could I resist this: the complete (and completely awesome) ending to the game, as played by the AI. As you’d expect, it’s Mario in a boss-fight with someone (okay, Bowser). Oh, and it’s not as easy as things first look – keep watching:

In fact, this looks ridiculously bleeding difficult. Aimed at casual gamers? Don’t be so sure.

[YouTube]

[VIDEO] Watch the super-rad ending to New Super Mario Bros. Wii is a post from: The Inquisitr

A new search engine quietly joined the fray in another attempt to slice and dice search results in a way you didn’t know you needed.

This year saw the launches of engines like Wolfram Alpha, Google Squared and Hunch, and let’s not forget Microsoft’s “decision engine.” The only thing worse than the Bing commercials that seem to still run ad nauseum is that my mother thinks they’re some sort of PSA for internet addiction, never passing up and opportunity to say, “see, Kim? SEE?” when I have the misfortune of catching one with her. While Bing is grabbing a bit of a foothold, it seems from a broad perspective that all of these upstarts are going to have to wake up a bit earlier to grab even a few stragglers from Google’s massive throng of users. (Also known as the internet in general.)

The general premise behind Goby is cute, but essentially sounds like the same song all the other “new” search engines this year are singing. “Google sucks at returning X-type of results, so Goby will optimize your X-search. Of course, it won’t catch on ’til it catches on, so please keep using it while it gets to where it needs to be.” Goby’s singular focus (find me thing to do in place at time) may give it some foothold, but the internet has marinated in Google, and old habits are hard to break. Giving Goby an initial spin seems to indicate some potential in doing what it says it does, but do we really need another search engine to do it?

Test driving Goby returned mixed results. Checking out the pre-listed categories, I did a search under “family fun” for playgrounds near my hometown of Babylon, NY. (Nightlife and restaurants are well-populated and I wanted to see how I fared with something less chronicled on the web.)

Results were fairly useless in this regard, a list of schools which could have been easily located by a Google Maps search for schools.

Next I tried “Indian restaurants,” a cuisine that is sorely underrepresented in this region of NYC suburbs. The results I returned were mainly for restaurants that have closed years ago, something I’d not have known if I were from the area but not a curry slurping fiend or were I merely visiting Long Island, assuming anyone would want to visit Long Island. One last attempt was for general “events” this weekend in my area. The number one result, and one that repeated throughout the top ten (amidst results for a car show, a pumpkin festival and a kids’ play) was “soccer registration” in Stamford, CT. Connecticut is a constant annoyance in search results for Long Islanders, as maps generally don’t recognize the Long Island effing Sound that’s wedged between Long Island and Connecticut. So while it may technically be under 25 miles away, I’m not hopping in my boat to go get samosas and biryani in New Haven. Ain’t happening, Goby.

While Goby may yet find an audience, those who are a little skilled in returning better Google results will probably end up sticking to what they know.

Goby is a new search engine, for finding “stuff to do” is a post from: The Inquisitr

And I mean that in the best possible way. If I sound a little giddy, it’s because I’ve just come from watching the latest trailer of New Super Mario Bros. Wii.

If you’re not already switched on to this game, then fix that. NSMBW is essentially a big-screen version of the Nintendo DS’s New Super Mario Bros. It is everything you love about 2D Mario games, but with the ability to have FOUR FREAKIN’ PLAYERS on screen at once.

It’s got Goombas, wildly inventive scrolling levels, and more Yoshi than I’ll probably ever be able to handle. It is the Mario game you always dreamed of as a kid, a great, big, sugary meringue of fun dipped in awesome sauce, and it hits the U.S. on November 15. Here’s a video to convert you:

[Via YouTube]

[VIDEO] New Super Mario Bros. Wii makes me feel eight again is a post from: The Inquisitr