Sky Mall, for my money (and that's what they want), is the best in-flight magazine ever. Period. Full stop.

As someone who really doesn't enjoy the whole flying "experience," Sky Mall was that little glossy-paged oasis that I reached for as soon as my seat belt was buckled, my tray table was in the full upright position, and my Xanax was kicking in.

It's pages full of crap stuff that no one really needs, but almost everyone really wants were a great distraction for white-knucklers like me.

Chalk up another victim to our technological habits. It seems more people are playing with their own electronic devices that are cracking the pages of Sky Mall. Something had to give, and with more relaxed regulations involving electronics in flight, that something is Sky Mall.

From CNN:

A visionary American accountant named Robert Worsley launched the catalog that inadvertently kept millions of passengers entertained on those excruciating hops between San Diego and Scranton, and then around the world.

 

SkyMall had a predecessor -- the GiftMaster catalog also featured quirky products no one would ever buy, yet somehow apparently did -- but now we're being told the golden age of inflight shopping has been done in by the pressures of technology.

 

According to the bankruptcy filing from SkyMall owner Xhibit Corp, the ubiquity of mobile devices and Internet access on airplanes pretty much doomed the old warhorse.

 

Numbers tell the tale:

In 2009, SkyMall's website generated $80.5 million in revenue, making it one of the top 200 e-commerce websites in the world. Add in about $50 million in magazine revenues (about the same amount the company reported bringing in from the magazine in 2000, according to a Travelocity magazine report) and the company was generating an estimated $130 million in revenue annually just half a decade ago.

 

Those big numbers have been cut in half over the recent years. I partially blame myself (actually, I blame my wife, Amy, for not letting me buy the life-sized Yeti Garden Sculpture), for not giving in to altitude-induced psychosis and buying more things that I really don't need.

I, for one, will miss you, Sky Mall.

 

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