Website / App to explore sites & find centers to dive them

[jturner]

It's probably also worth mentioning that there are now free sites backed by a large user group that do this role, such as this one: https://www.divessi.com/en-IC/mydiveguide/

Any diver logging their dives using SSI's free logbook can automatically pass on the key data to the site.

[dwhitlow]

Much of the diving around the UK involves dive boats and wrecks. There is lots of local information gathered by UK dive businesses and some show this on their websites.

Sure you can replicate that but people will defer to the people who are taking them diving and not some curious offshore site/app.

If you are looking to describe dive sites you'll also need to detail all the wreck round the UK. It might take a while but you can start at wrecksite.eu. It might take a while.

You could add data from UK dive boats. Here's a few on the south coast to keep you amused....

http://www.channeldiving.com/brighto...-diving-trips/
https://skindeepdiving.co.uk/
http://www.tangoofweymouth.co.uk/
https://www.scimitardiving.co.uk/
https://www.weychieftain.com/
https://www.oldharbourdivecentre.co.uk/
https://brightondiver.com/
http://www.sussexshipwrecks.co.uk/
https://www.dive125.co.uk/

... and there are plenty more around the country.

I struggle to see how you might add value. Good luck!

[Edward3c]

Any feedback or suggestion is welcome! Thanks in advance

When I’m researching dive operators I use Google, then follow up findings by going to each operator’s website.

Re: Stoney Cove. Your description is misleading and would discourage people who want a shallow dive on the 6m ledge, or mid depth on the 20m ledge. These are where most diving is done.

You have multiple entries for Puffin Dive Cenre.

You have the Scottish shore dive entries with depth ranges, these would be better described as max depth. For example, Finnet is listed as 15-25m and for beginners. In reality it’s anything to 50m and used by all - there are some nice Firework Anemone at 35m.

You don’t have the biggest dive operator in Glasgow listed, I won’t advertise them.

[Wibs]

Need to mention probably the most useful diving reference, wrecksite.eu.

This has a potted history of the wrecks and the subscription to the local charts — that alone makes it worth subscribing. There’s a fair amount of user generated content, especially underwater photos.

[jturner]

... but other than that, it sounds like a great idea!

[Wibs]

The success of sites such as TrustPilot is the sheer number of reviews that people write about their "stay". This should balance all the shills and idiots. Most of these people who use those sites see the utility of the reviews, and leave reviews as a kind of obligation.

A review of a hotel room is pretty easy: clean, quiet, nice, great view, or horrible, dirty, noisy, no view. So even the most numpty of people can leave a review that adds to the overall feel of the place. In other words, it's one simple question to answer: how was your stay and would you recommend it?

Diving however is a completely different thing. There's a loads of different questions to answer ranging from "what's the dive operation like?" through to "how do you get there", "what's the dive site like", "what's there to see", "whats the tidal conditions, when's best to dive", etc., etc. Thus a raw novice doesn't know what good looks like; an experienced diver's less likely to leave a review; a "tech" diver would have the wrong focus; different agencies would have different ideas, etc.


I really wish it could be better than this as we'd all benefit from multiple reviews of a location. The key is really getting some semi-professional copy writer to create the "page", and then get all and sundry to add their comments. With some good moderation it could be effective. Maybe some form of ability to recommend updates to the "page" contents??

[Allan Carr]

It's a bit like the Wikipedia of diving. It would be great if multiple divers couild add their reviews rather than just the dive operations themselves who are likely to post a rather up-beat view of their location.

[Discovereef]

Thanks for all those answers. Very insightful!

Indeed, being able to provide more content is on my todo list, but this is something really time consuming to try to provide an accurate description of the site even though you didn't dive there. And as was mentionned a couple of times, there could be ways to experience the same dive spot, so it's hard to classify it (I believe that classification is something important though to be able to filter easily)

I have in mind to do something like "I dived here", where you can indicate also with whom you dived and describe your diving experience (probably with an overall star rating as well), that way, with the description of the experience, you can see what the diver was looking for and what he got.

Anyway, thanks again for your feedback and let's see if I can manage to have the website gain traction & quality content.

[M-J-J]

I confess that I haven't looked at the others as I used divesitedirectory which I have found to be accurate but doesn't appear to have been updated in a while, it also seems to stick to 'official' commercial diving sites inland which I have little interest in personally.

I liked your site though, have updated Jc suba for you.

[M-J-J]

Just had a look at Dorothea, feedback on the site would be:
Average depth - because of the size of the site I would say the average of 45m is misleading. My most recent visit was a 2hr dive into the 104m tunnel (I had 102m) my average depth was still only 25.3m. Unless you do a bounce, 45m average doesnt seem likely, any sensible dive beyond 45m is going to dive some shallow deco which throws the average.

Level - there is lots to see in the shallows, so I understand 'all levels' to an extent. But the cold, drops, the vis can be variable depending on depth and weather. There are overhead elements even in the shallows, and the depth if buoyancy is off, there are several examples of people having rope from the bouys breaking and entangling the divers underneath. The walk in and out, deco obligations, and people fizzing up from doing NDL dives but immediately humping kit up the hill. Im not sure I would say it is all levels of ability...

Aside from that, the current entry requirements are you need a standalone BSAC membership, plus membership of the NWTD and a 'technical' diving qualification (which needs to be submitted to them).

That is in addition to whatever ability may be appropriate to dive the place.

I changed the current to none, but there is a cracking story on the BBC stating that the currents have dragged people under - at least the didn't say someone was cut off by the tide...

The dropdown boxes are great for simplicity, but the reality is that a lot of dive sites are highly dynamic and dont fit into a box.

Still a great idea and potentially great resource but you may wish to add some freehand under each area or have an option that says 'see description' instead of over simplfying?