Along with a bit of legroom and a free dinner, an engrossing read and a range of inflight entertainment are now routinely expected by any seasoned air traveller.

According to the Paris-based Inflight Marketing Bureau (IMB), every week more than five million people fly within and from Europe. This is a very receptive - and a very captive - audience, according to the IMB. And so airlines and advertisers provide flyers with a range of media in this unique environment, 35,000 feet above the earth. "No other combination of land-based media can impact this audience, as dramatically, efficiently, or effectively," the IMB claims.

Of course, right now there is a serious worry that this audience is disappearing - and that many airlines cannot afford to serve them at all, let alone give them a magazine. The crunch in aviation that has come to the fore since September 11th is certainly affecting inflight media (see panel). But where do such media come from, and why are they provided?

A great many airlines now have a good monthly magazine, often separate from a guide to other inflight entertainment, such as audio and films. The inflight magazine was first tried by the Pan American airline in the 1930s, when it stocked its fleet with brochures of duty-free goods for sale, and more brochures with tips on the airline's destinations. It took other airlines another two decades to grasp the concept and, today, some airlines are still struggling with the idea of providing a magazine.

Aer Lingus's inflight magazine was started in the 1960s and has gone through various reincarnations over the last 30 years. The current editor of Cara, Paul Whitington, says that the magazine now covers quite a broad range of issues: "We don't just do four green fields - touristy Ireland - we do social issues and documentary stuff." On the other hand, Ryanair, the low fares airline, does not have an inflight magazine - merely a brochure advertising products that can be bought inflight.

Inflight publications are published in a number of different ways, but, in common with most of the publications you read, they are all funded by advertising. Some magazines are published in-house by the airlines themselves, by their communications department or as part of their public-relations effort.

Many magazines, however, are contracted out by the various airlines to publishing companies with experience in the magazine market.

In some cases when the magazine is contracted out like this, the publishers pay the airline a percentage of the profits. In other cases the publishers pay nothing and the airlines are happy to have a magazine customers can read.

Over the next week or so, Aer Arann Express, a domestic Irish air carrier, will be stocking its planes with copies of its new magazine, Express It.

The idea, according to the airline's marketing executive, Deborah Kennedy, is that people "will take it away with them and bring it back to their house and their family will flick through it. It just increases our awareness as well."

Over the last few months, the magazine had a change of publishers, and during that time Kennedy says the company questioned whether it really needed such a publication. "We were toying with the idea - but then it was off the aircraft for four months and people were crying out for it; they were asking the crew.

"The feedback was that passengers wanted it. Even though the majority of our flights take only 35 minutes, people still liked to have something to flick through." Although a daily national newspaper was offered on board, passengers still wanted the magazine.

While the magazine may be the first thing passengers grab on shorter flights, on longer international flights people put on their headphones and fiddle with the little buttons to see what entertainment the small screen in front of them will conjure. While once upon a time long-haul passengers had to crane their necks to see a screen at the front of the plane, many airlines now offer a choice of films, satellite television, radio and video games embedded in the back of the seat, to keep passengers occupied between meals!

Air is not the only medium of transport that demands the entertainment of passengers. Seafarers need entertaining too: cabaret entertainment, casinos, bars and children's play areas are no longer the only entertainment on ferries. Although ferries out of Ireland do not have the in-seat television screens that some international air passengers enjoy, most do have cinemas - fee-paying of course.

Ferries have also embraced the concept of giving passengers free reading material - something more in-depth than the back of a beer mat. Irish Ferries is an onboard magazine veteran at this stage and has been publishing the well-established Fβilte/Welcome magazine once a year for more than a decade.

Earlier this year Stena Line launched its onboard magazine, Starboard, on its ferries to and from D·n Laoghaire, Dublin and Rosslare. The magazine was introduced as "added value" for the customer, i.e. something interesting to read, while also giving Stena Line an opportunity to advertise its products and services and information about its route network.

Iarnr≤d ╔ireann, like rail companies across the globe, has also jumped on the magazine bandwagon. It has a magazine for its Intercity trains, a magazine specifically for the Belfast Enterprise route and a freesheet newspaper for its DART and suburban services, which can be found at stations.

But what about the language barrier? Not every passenger, even on domestic flights, has the same mother tongue. Irish Ferries deals with this problem by having a welcome note in a few languages in its onboard magazine.

Air France deals with the fact that many of its passengers are non-French-speaking by publishing a monthly bi-lingual magazine, Magazine Air France, which has articles in English with a French flavour; it is not specifically directed at any one nationality, but at an international clientele. As it happens, this month's magazine features 15 pages on Dublin. However, French pride is not entirely vanquished: Marion Picard, Air France's Dublin-based marketing officer, insists that the English translation doesn't do justice to the French material.