Southwest Airlines is the next airline to begin testing Internet access on flights, beginning this summer. The satellite service will be tested on four planes. Unfortunately, you won’t be able to request a flight that is performing the test.

Google’s got a pretty good sense of timing; even as holiday vacations are kicking in all over the country, the search giant has improved its ability to check flights’ statuses.

Two months ago, we reported that Alaska Air would be the first U.S. airline carrier to test satellite Internet access on their flights. Now, several other airlines have followed suit—but it looks like they might beat Alaska Airlines to the punch.

Google wanted a lawsuit by American Airlines over the search engine’s advertising practices dismissed, but a federal judge denied the motion.

Nobody really debates too much about keyword metatags anymore. Google and MSN ignore them, Yahoo and Ask don’t, but go stuffing them or you risk search engine penalties. But rarely does anybody bring up the legal liabilities of what’s in your keyword tags.

The whole keyword-advertising-violates-our-trademark debate has been brought to court more than once and more than once has been unsuccessful. American Airlines, though, is perhaps the largest company to make the claim, filing a trademark violation suit against Google.

Airline travelers will soon have the opportunity to surf the Internet mid-flight by way of wireless networks, as many aircraft are now beginning to be outfitted with WiFi equipment. Even though the FCC has put it stamp of approval for in-flight WiFi, it still has reservations about the viability of offering cellular service to airline passengers.

These are two mostly unrelated thoughts, but that’s what you get some days.