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Old 04-09-2018, 08:13 AM   #27
CaptTom
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City: Southern Maine
Vessel Model: Prairie 36 Coastal Cruiser
Join Date: Dec 2012
Posts: 2,717
Quote:
Originally Posted by Comodave View Post
Looks like an opportunity for someone to develop a new breed of Active Captain and make their own fortune...
I've been looking at three options which could be replacements for AC:

- Squiddio plug-in for OpenCPN, the free and open-source charting tool.
- Waterway Guides, an already-established cruising guide.
- Zulu Waterways - Already well established down under, looking to expand to other areas. Complete with smart phone app.

I haven't actually used any of these underway yet. My own take is:
- Squiddio shows real promise, being associated with an open-source platform, but from what I can tell they haven't really finished fleshing out how to capture the specific data types cruisers need.
- Waterway Guides is an unabashedly for-profit company, but their primary product is and always was cruising information. They'll be around for the long term and you know exactly what your contributions are going for and how they will be used by other cruisers.
- Zulu Waterways is most like the old AC, and if they can get a toe hold in North America and/or Europe, could easily fill the gap that AC left behind.

At this point my own plan is to contribute to the WWG and Zulu, and keep an eye on Squiddio to see how the data storage format issue is resolved.
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