United Airlines' in-flight Wi-Fi service reserves the right to block any website the company deems "inappropriate or unsuitable for in-flight viewing."

It looks like Ars Technica made the list, along with The New York Times and some other news sites. Electronic Frontier Foundation staff attorney Nate Cardozo said yesterday that he was unable to open any of these sites on United's in-flight Wi-Fi. (There's more on this story on TechDirt.)

"Access to this site is currently restricted" is the message Cardozo got when he navigated to Ars, the Times, The Verge, and Daily Kos.

United's in-flight Wi-Fi FAQ says the company "does not allow customers to access certain websites that may be inappropriate or unsuitable for inflight viewing," but it doesn't say what guidelines it uses to judge such matters. United also doesn't support video streaming, a common rule on in-flight Wi-Fi because of bandwidth limitations.

We contacted United's public relations department today to ask why news sites are getting caught up in its filter. A company spokesperson responded but with no real details, saying only, "We have your inquiry. We had an issue this morning, but it has been resolved."

There are no legal concerns regarding net neutrality, since the Federal Communications Commission's rules exempt airlines and other premises operators.

We're not sure why those other news organizations were blocked, but we'll just have to assume that Ars hit the unsavory list sometime after Lee Hutchinson wrote a series of first-person articles describing his poop.

UPDATE: It appears United has taken Ars off the block list. Made it, Ma! Top of the world!