Active Captian Web Site

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timur

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Greetings:
I am a new C-Dory owner (22 Cruiser) waiting for the ice to melt here in Maine. An acquaintance here has started a great new website that I think will be of interest to C-Brats. Check out www.activecaptain.com. You register and then use the chart to locate both marinas and favorite anchorages. Then you can add relevant notes. The site is brand new (2/07) and has generated a lot of interest. Check it out.
Tom
 
timur,

I tried to view that website and they said I had to install Adobe Flash Player. I went to Adobe and found that the flash player allows 'third party' tracking cookies. There is a way to disable those cookies, but I wonder why does Adobe do that in the first place, and why should I have to worry about my security just to check out that site.

Do you have any connection with that site?

Since that site appears commercial, what are they selling?

Almost nothing on the internet is really free, C-Brats excepted(and we even have advertising shown to non-members)

Curious,
 
Larry H":1xjomj0k said:
...and why should I have to worry about my security just to check out that site.

Do you have any connection with that site?

Since that site appears commercial, what are they selling?
Click to expand...

Tom told me that he was going to make a posting about ActiveCaptain. I went to check it out and found your questions. I'm the owner of the site and I'm happy to answer them all.

ActiveCaptain uses cookies as a way to handle registration and login. This is a very standard way to do this type of thing. We also produce "Flash cookies" used to store the last position you were looking at on the map, etc. We have a pretty complete Privacy Policy that we follow without exception.

The only connection that Tom has is that we live in the same town. He has used the site and probably has found it valuable. So have the 2,000 other registered users that we currently have.

I'd love to know why the site "looks commercial." If it's because it looks good, well, I'll take that as a compliment. There is nothing commercial about it. We don't even have or accept any advertising. It is hosted on a dedicated server (notice how quick the response is) and the whole thing costs me money every month. Frankly, it isn't a lot of money. The web site is currently free and there are no plans to charge anything to use it.

We will most certainly release additional software for mobile phones in the future that will allow all of the ActiveCaptain data to be retrieved and viewed remotely. The software will do many other things as well such as basic navigation on ENC nautical charts, anchor alarms, weather accumulation and presentation, etc. That software will have a cost but that will no way limit or change the access that anyone can have to the web site for free.

My wife and I cruise ourselves. I'm actually on my boat right now on a mooring at the Vero Beach City Marina. We built this site and these capabilities because there was nothing like it and we thought there was a latent need for it. There really is nothing more sinister to it than that.

I'd be happy to answer any questions directly, online or offline.

Jeffrey Siegel
 
Larry,

I looked and it didn't set off any bells or whistles from my firewalls etc.
NOTE. I did not join so maybe that doesn't mean much.

Don't have time to peruse today but from first sight it looks to be a very useful idea and if I have understood it correctly would use input from "locals" rather like many of the cruising guides.

Maybe one of our super nerds can advise on any security issues.

Merv
 
Merv,

It loaded fine for me - no requests for cookies...
and I ain't no nerd! If he isn't selling anything, not sure we have a problem. And if it helps, that's good.

Dusty
 
Jeffery, Merv,

Thanks for the additional info,

My first concern is the way this site was introduced here. New member 'timur', in his second post, uses the web site's www in the post topic. It would be better to use the word 'New web site of interest to members' or some other words not directly advertising the site in the post topic.

Jeffery,

If you are doing this for the benefit of boaters in general, thank you, however you do say that you intend to sell software in the future.

I have not actually looked at your site, as I was put off by having to download a new to me 'flash player' which wants to include a Yahoo toolbar (tracker) and then requires me to learn how to disable 'third party tracking cookies', for my security.

Do you have any 'third party tracking cookies' on your web site?

Do you have any interest in C-Brats other than to advertise your web site?

The C-Brats have a policy of not allowing outside commercial advertising in our forums.

I am not a site administrator, and I will leave that sort of decision to them.

Good boatin' to yah!

Larry H
 
I honestly don't understand why ActiveCaptain has this effect on some people. The exact same thing happened when it first went live. panbo.com is a pretty well respected blog on marine electronics. Refer to:
http://www.panbo.com/yae/archives/001492.html

To answer your questions:

- We only use cookies for our own site that we create. There are no third-party cookies. There are three types of cookies that we create: (a) a session cookie maintains your current session and allow you to remain logged in over each transaction of a single session; (b) a regular cookie is used if you request to be automatically logged on whenever you go to the site; your one-way encoded password is stored in this cookie (no one can retrieve your password from the encoded data); and (c) a Flash cookie is used to remember state information for the map display.

- I have an interest in boating. I've seen C-Dory's and C-Rangers but I never joined this site until today. I have no desire to advertise anything. Tom emailed me that he just bought a C-Dory 22 and wanted to post something about our site. I had absolutely nothing to do with Tom's posting.


I don't think that Tom "advertised" anything. I think he has used our site and found it helpful. As a new C-Dory owner he probably wanted to contribute in some way although I don't want to put words into his mouth. Again, we have 2,000 registered boaters. They have made almost 30,000 changes to the data. There is not a more complete list of marinas and anchorages anywhere. We're just building the anchorage database now - we could use help.

Please read the panbo.com information. Please just give it a chance.
 
I checked it and it is working fine. It uses Flash but if you got tabs displayed at the top, Flash is working.

Perhaps you should try register again.

Out of 2,000 users, there have been about 10 who have had problems because their security was set too high for a Web 2.0 application like this.
 
Jeffery,

I read the reviews about your site and took a chance, downloaded the flash player, set security settings, joined your site, logged in and took a look.

Could be a good thing.

Good luck with your endeavors.

PS I am NOT the Larry mentioned re: rec.boating sites, I don't do those sites. I do recall reading about your site on the Trawlers and Trawlering mailing list.

I do stand by my opinion about the way this was posted, a little to commercial for this site.

timur,

Welcome to the site here, I hope you enjoy your C-Dory as much as I enjoyed mine.

Larry H
 
ActiveCaptain":3gx9k61j said:
I checked it and it is working fine. It uses Flash but if you got tabs displayed at the top, Flash is working.

Perhaps you should try register again.

Out of 2,000 users, there have been about 10 who have had problems because their security was set too high for a Web 2.0 application like this.
Click to expand...

I tried again. Something with a title of Captain Registration flashes by, but then there is nothing left but a blue horizontal bar and tabs at the bottom starting with News Arhive. Any other ideas.

Rob
 
It is most probably your internet security settings. They aren't allowing enough of these Web 2.0 capabilities to work.

I have my Internet Security set at Medium-High.

There is a possibility that firewall settings are blocking it too. It could also be virus protection. There are a variety of things that are there to stop access from legitimate sites.

If you allow actions from www.activecaptain.com, that could fix the problem.

We've had only a handful of problems and all of them have been resolved. If you can't get it to work, write to me off-forum at jeff@activecaptain.com and I'll work setting-by-setting with you to get it to work.
 
I can vouch for Jeffery and his sites. He is being modest and not telling you of all of his other mapping software and communications contributions to the boating community.

Jeff has been a member of Trawler World/Trawlers and Trawlering for at least 5 years--probably longer.

This is a great site--I had put in some corrections for our areas, but haven't as much as I really should...
 
I am certain Jeffery and his intentions are honorable, and trust that his site is great. However, I am tiring of hosting the FAQs and promos for it. Commercial or otherwise, this is not the forum for touting that forum beyond its mention and comments from our members.

Mike
C-Brats Admin
 
Greetings,

Although I do not have a C-Dory, I got involved in this thread because i recommended Activecaptain to Tom, and he was rather surprised at some of the reaction he got when he passed it on to this list. He has cruised with me in BC and WA.
Anyway, my point is that we should be glad that people develop useful software. Sometimes it is free, like Google and Gmail, even though someone is making money.
Most of us like to tell friends and acquaintances about our cruises and gives tips that help. I see Activecaptain in this light. I find it lots of fun to give my experiences on marinas and anchorages in this way. It sort of helps to relive the experience.
Presently I am going through my videos to refresh my memory as I enter new info into Activecaptain.
I hope some of you give some PNW tips before I beat you to it. Ha ha.

Have a good start in the new boating season, Irving
 
Irving,

Welcome to the site.

The reaction wasn't because of what he told us, but the way it was presented.

This site is not for the promotion of businesses or other sites. :amgry

This site is for discussion among it's members of C-Dorys and related topics.

Be careful, if you stick around too long, you might wind up with a C-Dory! :wink
 
I guess I understand that the way the original posting came in was offensive. It was the user's first posting and it might have seemed like there was some subversive attempt to get free publicity for another web site. It wasn't like that at all. In fact, the only reason that I wrote my follow up (my first posting) was that it was obvious that Tom's posting had been taken the wrong way.

What I don't understand is why a posting referring to a useful site is wrong. The site is designed to give boaters like all of you a resource. It is free and as such works by word of mouth. Isn't this a word of mouth facility?

How is this any different than mentioning a new fuel additive? What about references to boatzincs.com? And no, I'm not affiliated with them at all. I buy my zincs there because they have good prices and they have given me great service. I'd suspect (but haven't checked) that the site has been mentioned on C-Brats before too because others most probably have had the same experience.

In general, boaters are friendly and helpful. While cruising I find them to be the "salt of the earth." Funny how the word "salt" is used there. Instead of assuming that a new poster is doing something commercial or hidden, perhaps they should be invited openly to contribute. I doubt you have very many "bad" posters at all from what I've seen. If the environment is kept open and friendly, you'll surely attract more of the good kind.

Jeffrey Siegel
www.activecaptain.com
 
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