Should SB be required reading in OW classes?

[skelzer]

Nothing personal... and note this is coming from a relative tech-head that spends far too much time in forums and only buys online... but to me, Scuba is the last remaining bastion of "support the little guy" whenever possible. No other retailer can match what a good LDS can do to help guide you through equipment options and training that could very likely save your life. Now I'm aware that it's hard to find a decent LDS that will "set you free" only to hope they get repeat business but mine does exactly that. In fact, they were the ones that referred me to SB to reinforce my specialty training and Suunto RGBM questions. The shop definitely has some swagger and they're usually busy as hell... so maybe it's easier when business is good. Either way, although I *always* benchmark new purchases against LeisurePro... I usually try my best to buy via my LDS, even if I have to drive 30 mins each way. If anything, it's to thank them for their patience with all of my relentless curiosity.

Edit - Btw, yes I agree with the OP... various threads on SB should be required reading. My comments were only intended to counter a few subsequent posts which discounted the value of a good LDS.

 

[drrich2]

I'm not knocking the value of a good LDS. It can be hard for one to function. Not all potential customers need their help, and even the 'home-grown, trained here' OW divers they produce may be disillusioned by learning of lower online prices, and customer loyalty to a business can often to summed as per that old song line 'What have you done for me lately?'

I, too, like to buy from my LDS when it's cost-effective and convenient, and they carry the brand and model that I'm after. But like a number of ScubaBoarders, I pick quite a range of gear, and no one shop's apt to have it all. And I'm not even in BP/W or tech. diving.

Richard.

 

[chillyinCanada]

I think my LDS is the bomb! Anything I've ever wanted that they didn't have was ordered in for me.

 

[Jude Reilly]

This is one of those "here's the swing...and here's the roundabout" questions. I have found SB to be very helpful but had I wandered in here as a beginner diver, I would have been totally overwhelmed by the amount of information available. Knowledge is never a bad thing, but too much knowledge too soon can be confusing and in some cases off-putting.
For beginner OW students, sending them into SB, would IMO, do more harm than good, but by all means if you, as their instructor find a discussion that is relevant and helpful to them... then that's what a printer is for, or a projector.
As far as the impact on a local LDS, most people already research online before visiting the LDS anyway, if the lds has good staff, they will be able to discuss your needs vs your research.
Bottom line, there is good stuff and not so good stuff, waiting until a diver has a little experience behind them before mentioning SB would probably be best.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

ScubaBoard isn't anti-LDS at all ... it has helped many of them thrive and survive over the years. I remember when ScubaToys was just a local dive shop. The two guys who own the business used to post on ScubaBoard regularly. When they first started their online sales, there used to be testimonials from happy divers posted on here regularly ... so regularly in fact that Pete created the Kudos forum. If you go look at the oldest posts in that forum, most of them mentioned ScubaToys. ScubaBoard helped turn them into a national success. Same can be said for several other dive shops and businesses over the years ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

---------- Post added February 19th, 2014 at 04:36 AM ----------

This is one of those "here's the swing...and here's the roundabout" questions. I have found SB to be very helpful but had I wandered in here as a beginner diver, I would have been totally overwhelmed by the amount of information available. Knowledge is never a bad thing, but too much knowledge too soon can be confusing and in some cases off-putting.
For beginner OW students, sending them into SB, would IMO, do more harm than good, but by all means if you, as their instructor find a discussion that is relevant and helpful to them... then that's what a printer is for, or a projector.
As far as the impact on a local LDS, most people already research online before visiting the LDS anyway, if the lds has good staff, they will be able to discuss your needs vs your research.
Bottom line, there is good stuff and not so good stuff, waiting until a diver has a little experience behind them before mentioning SB would probably be best.

I had the same experience. I discovered ScubaBoard just a few months after I started diving, and was completely intimidated by the sheer amount of information available ... and it was much smaller back then. It was probably three or four months before I dared make my first post here. Once I got comfortable though, they couldn't shut me up ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[Skittl1321]

PADI would probably prefer that their students not visit ScubaBoard so that they don't learn that PADI is not the only game in town.

Kind of depends on the town. Knowing about the other agencies doesn't make them exist here...

I also found scubaboard before my OW class, and it gave me some good questions to ask my instructors. But there was a lot of bull**** to weed through as well.

 

[Lorenzoid]

This is one of those "here's the swing...and here's the roundabout" questions. I have found SB to be very helpful but had I wandered in here as a beginner diver, I would have been totally overwhelmed by the amount of information available. Knowledge is never a bad thing, but too much knowledge too soon can be confusing and in some cases off-putting.
For beginner OW students, sending them into SB, would IMO, do more harm than good, but by all means if you, as their instructor find a discussion that is relevant and helpful to them... then that's what a printer is for, or a projector.
As far as the impact on a local LDS, most people already research online before visiting the LDS anyway, if the lds has good staff, they will be able to discuss your needs vs your research.
Bottom line, there is good stuff and not so good stuff, waiting until a diver has a little experience behind them before mentioning SB would probably be best.

I agree with this. A few posters have said they read SB during their OW class and found it helpful. That's great, but I suspect that kind of person is the minority. For the majority of OW students, I think SB would be information overload. There is a reason the PADI/NAUI/SSI materials are compact and easily digestible: the agencies want to make diving look easy and don't want to scare students off. If instead of a course book of a couple hundred pages of big type and simple illustrations, the class materials were some giant treatise examining every aspect of diving, most students would feel overwhelmed. Like many others, I think the PADI course materials look like they're written for an audience of 10 year-olds, but PADI is right to err on the side of simplicity. SB is useful, but some of the discussions could easily scare OW students off. I can't imagine being an OW student and as my first exposure to SB seeing a heated discussion of split fins. "I thought fins would be the last thing that could be subject to debate?! Gee, I don't want to buy the 'wrong' fins." If I were an OW instructor hoping to attract and retain divers, I'd just tell my students to buy a pair of fins--period. Same for most initial gear choices. Just get settled into diving first. I rented gear for a long time before I bought anything beyond mask, fins and wetsuit. By the time I was ready to purchase a BC and reg set, I was well aware of on-line options and how to search for product reviews.

Teach OW students ONE way to do things, simplify the initial gear selection for them, etc. If they really enjoy diving, they have the rest of their lives to try other things and will probably end up with lots of different gear.

Ignorance is bliss. Sometimes, I almost wish I could go back to not knowing what I have learned on SB and just enjoy flailing around in my "poodle jacket" and split fins, following my computer in blissful ignorance. Okay, not really. I've learned plenty of things that would benefit even a new OW student. But having OW students read SB is not the answer.

 

[uncfnp]

I am in the camp in favor of knowledge and more knowledge is better than less. SB is another piece of gear that I keep in my dive bag and like the other equipment it's better to be informed and prepared then to just jump in with it. Some may use it every dive, others occasionally, then others may decide it's not for them but at least they know about it and can make an informed decision to use or not.

It's true that a thick skin can be helpful but that is mostly for posters. And yes, there is a learning curve for Scubaboard. Lurking on SB though can also provide a lot of info and then when/if the diver is ready they can "get wet."

I think that the shear number of new divers, learning divers and thinking about diving (yes there is even a forum for them) on SB speaks to the ability of new divers to process the information without the need for others to decide what is best for them or what they should or should not know.

Over the years, SB has provided me with Aha! moments, I can't believe they wrote that moments, complete disbelief moments, and a lot of good belly laugh moments. And because much of it is opinion mixed with facts, brilliance mixed with madness, it has helped hone my critical thinking skills. It has helped make me a thinking diver and not just a "follow the leader" reactive diver.

And as Jim and others have pointed out, it's not just SB but all the other rich and diverse resources available to divers that are not part of the established curriculum but can enhance any divers knowledge foundation and help them build a mind and skill set to keep them alive and make diving even more rewarding.

Why would I not want this opportunity for new divers?

 

[LowVizWiz]

I got pretty much the same treatment from my LDS. I always wonder what their experience was on here that led to them giving that kind of response.

Almost every time I walk into a LDS I hear some kind of stretching of the truth by someone trying to sell something and that's exactly the kind of thing that a LDS cannot get away with here. However, there are quite a few business owners who participate in SB and they benefit from a captive audience because they let their services and practices do the talking and not some ridiculous half-truth.

To the OP:
I recommend SB to every diver I meet who's not already part of the board, but I offer to be their safety float rather than say, "The pool is open, sink or swim bud!" And push them into the wild open ocean that is SB.

I usually point them to one specific post or article related to our conversation so they are not met with the "Use the search function" type of post.

 

[Bob DBF]

This is one of those "here's the swing...and here's the roundabout" questions. I have found SB to be very helpful but had I wandered in here as a beginner diver, I would have been totally overwhelmed by the amount of information available. Knowledge is never a bad thing, but too much knowledge too soon can be confusing and in some cases off-putting.

This is more of a problem of the internet than Scubaboard itself. If you had never gone to any information specific forum, I can see the problem with dropping into one unaware, and the size of Scubaboard would not ease the situation. If you are already familiar with the opinion nature of the information on internet forums, and other sites on the web, it would just be getting used to the new subject matter.


Bob