Let's play a game! How many Virgin companies can you name off the top of your head?

Without looking it up, here's what we can come up with: Virgin America, Virgin Atlantic (who remembers Virgin Express?), V Australia, Virgin Australia, Virgin Galactic, Virgin Oceanic, Virgin Trains, Virgin Balloons, Virgin Megastores, Virgin Limobike, Virgin Money, Virgin Radio, Virgin Active, Virgin Mobile, Virgin Wines (!!) and wow—so many more. Just mentioning the fact that we recently took a Virgin Train from London to Liverpool produced the following reaction from a friend: "THEY DO TRAINS TOO?!"

Yes indeed Virgin does do trains, and now there's something else to add to that long list of what they do do: Virgin Hotels. That's right; Sir Richard Branson wants you to sleep with him...finally. ]]> JetSetCD 2011-11-09T09:40:02-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2011/10/11/101156/16
Branson and Al Gore at a past eco-event in 2007

Virgin CEO Richard Branson has had a busy day. Earlier in London, he gathered Virgin employees together at Battersea Power Station to announce that a new low-carbon fuel was being developed for use in powering Virgin Atlantic planes. It'd be "just half the carbon footprint of the standard fossil fuel alternative" and hopefully pushing planes through the sky from Shanghai and Delhi to London as soon as 2014.

It's kind of a big deal, and it means that Branson has given up on his earlier idea of creating jet fuel from coconut oil. This new stuff will be made from "waste gases from industrial steel production being captured, fermented and chemically converted using Swedish Biofuels technology." Intense! It's not just throwing garbage into the flux capacitor!

Alas, Virgin Atlantic isn't anywhere near alone on the Biofuels technology front...]]> JetSetCD 2011-10-11T10:11:56-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2011/9/26/94652/0753

So this is interesting. Virgin Group head honcho Richard Branson has contributed to a massive $85 million round of funding for microblogging site Tumblr. The New York Times broke the news first thing this morning, and it's already coursing through the interwebs like the hot gossip it is.

The money will go towards scaling up Tumblr and improving features for its 30 million blogs. ]]> JetSetCD 2011-09-26T13:39:35-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2011/9/7/7138/49507

Awesome, possibly game-changing news in the land of Oz from our friends at Australian Business Traveller! Sir Richard Branson and his Virgin group of airlines are no stranger to in-flight technology, and now it looks like Virgin Australia is next in line for an upgrade. The airline is working on all kinds of in-flight entertainment options behind the scenes, but the one we’re most interested in is WiFi access.

Don’t start emailing friends and family while traveling down under just yet, as it sounds like the wireless capabilities might be used for things other than watching YouTube videos. Virgin Australia is actually planning to use the connectivity to pass along new entertainment options—like movies and music—rather than just Internet access. However, we have our doubts that they’ll be able to resist offering in-flight connectivity to one and all once the technology is on board. ]]> kjb 2011-09-07T08:38:19-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2011/8/15/14858/4035

The United States doesn't really have a space travel program any more, inasmuch as our leaders found better and more inspirational programs to fund than ones that have astronauts literally reaching for the stars (e.g. empty rural airports in the home states of powerful Senators).

The problem is that NASA still has engineers and scientists who need to run experiments in low-gravity and no-gravity conditions, and they'd kind of like to keep doing some of those. So agency officials looked around, scratched their collective heads, and checked if there was still anyone still doing that space flight thing.

And that's the short version of how Virgin Galactic became NASA's official sub-contracter. The press release is here, and if you click through make sure you at least read the bolded quote in the middle of the release. It's the longest string of words that mean the least that you'll ever encounter.]]> Omri 2011-08-15T15:34:05-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2011/8/1/181846/7449

A few days ago, a brilliant CollegeHumor video spoof hit the net and—crazily enough—one of the first people to give it publicity was the spoof's target: Sir Richard Branson. The Virgin Group head honcho tweeted the link, effectively gave it his blessing and we've been saving it for a special days: Travel Tuesday.

We won't spoil it for you too much, except to say that our favorite part is the bit about the Billiard Room, and that some of the comments are predictably hilarious. Sample: "I thought this video would have airplane jousting...like 2 airplanes with massive jousting sticks flying towards each other."

Trust us that it's better than that. And as we know well from experience, there's only one boring thing about Richard Branson. So Collegehumor has it pretty spot-on after all, except they neglected to mention Branson's dream to wear red tights. ]]> JetSetCD 2011-08-02T09:00:01-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2011/7/12/111315/059

Fill in the blank: "Richard Branson's heart is made of _________." Some possibly popular answers could be "billions of dollars," "Virgin red," or even "charity," but really if you take it literally, Richard Branson's heart is made of island. Nope, not his beloved Necker Island in the Caribbean, but his other island, a heart-shaped in Australia's Noosa River. It's name is Makepeace Island, and Branson bought it back in 2003 with the intention of turning it into an eco-retreat for crew of his Virgin Australia airline (then called Virgin Blue).

Makepeace Island has hit the headlines today, however, because it's now open to the paying public, if you've got at least 7,900 AUD ($8,300) per night. Its spent its last few years as a private retreat for Branson's family and that of the CEO of Virgin Australia, but we guess they've got other places to go and people to see now.

For takers, the 25-acre island offers Balinese-style accommodations for up to 22 guests, and it's not out in the middle of nowhere either. Makepeace is only a quick riverboat hop from the heart of tourism in Australia's "Sunshine Coast." Oh yea, and it's got volcanic boulder bathtubs: ]]> JetSetCD 2011-07-12T12:40:01-05:00 Search Jaunted string http://www.jaunted.com/search/