Airplane mode does not equal off

GP, you’re kind of glossing over the difference between takeoff/landing , when all devices must be completely turned off, and electronics use during cruise, when  the requirement is essentially that there are no radio transmissions.  That document you linked of course goes over all the specifics.   It’s the “non critical phases of flight” that airplane mode is intended for, and in my experience the cabin crew briefing is usually clear that airplane mode must be enabled before turning off the device (prior to take off), so that it’s enabled later when you turn the device on. 

Of course, I guess the rant is about the people who never pay attention to the cabin crew briefings and think they’re much more important because they’re a frequent flier and have an important business deal to close or whatever.  I can see your point there.

Brer, that’s an interesting point as many modern electronics can’t truly be turned off completely – there is often some electron flow powering a small area of the circuit responsible for keeping memory alive, keeping clocks going, etc.  The key question is whether the Macbook generates interference or not, and that’s extremely difficult to know without extensive testing.  I personally would suggest you use “hibernate” mode instead where the machine is completely shut down (but the contents of memory saved to disk), that would be safer.  But I agree that sleep mode probably would never emit enough interference to cause any sort of problem.