United Airlines passengers were greeted with a stark message on their seat back entertainment screens when they boarded a recent flight to Chicago O’Hare. The airline’s message to its customers: BITE ME, or rather every seat back screen showed the greeting: “Welcome aboard flight BITEME1 to Chicago.”

Several commenters thought this was appropriate for the state of United today, “Finally, an honest frequent‑flyer program name” and “United’s new Saver award code: BITEME1.”

Roughly half of internet commentators laugh it off (“If this genuinely makes you mad, you need to take it easy. Life isn’t that serious.”) while the other half call it “unprofessional.”

This wasn’t the pilots, who don’t have an interface to that field. They do not interact with the inflight entertainment system. Most likely this was accidentally left by maintenance. Techs frequently type nonsense placeholders while working on the inflight entertainment – and it got left there without the field being reset. They’re currently rolling out new software.