WAFI’s on GCaptain Forums

Continuing the discussion from 8 dead after duck boat sinks at Table Rock Lake near Branson, Missouri:

In order to not derail the DUKW discussion…

At least he’s not talking about “being on the Briny” (an El Faro WAFI) or demanding we launch and use our lifeboats to rescue him in heavy seas (another WAFI who shall not be named).

That poses a good question though. I thought this was a forum purposed for Professional Mariners? I can accept the yacht guys that are paid to be deck, engine, or steward… but the rapid influx of armchair sailors every time there’s something remotely marine related is a little exasperating.

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A while ago, after seeing a reference to a cruiser’s forum on gCaptain related to the 2 crazy women who sailed in circles until they ran out of fuel and asked to be rescued because they apparently didn’t know how to use the sails, I decided to check it out.
I was highly entertained by the posts until I read one claiming that SAR personnel deserved to go on a wild goose chase because they were getting paid to do nothing anyway. I registered so I could respond to his post.
I didn’t call him names but politely explained why he didn’t know what he was talking about.
An administrator deleted my post and sent me a pm berating me for being “unfriendly”. Go figure…
That was my first and last visit to the internet world of cruising WAFIs.

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Pilots forums also get invaded by - how to say - relatively uninformed non-pilots after major air disasters as well. This is human nature, maybe they just do a search for “duck boat forum” or something.
As far as “cruisers forums”, the literal cruisersforum.com is famous for kicking people off. They end up at sailinganarchy.com where you can cuss and post boobs and whatever you want.

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That’s the one.

gCaptain used to allow such shenanigans… ok, maybe not allow, but ignored them for the most part. Maybe we should have a private forum on here for such things for those that would agree to hold gCaptain harmless for anything said or seen? The tech is there in the forum system. :grin:

I liken it to the same WAFI’s sitting dead center in a narrow channel and calling you on the VHF to make a passing arrangement. GTFO of the channel is the passing arrangement!

Extra points when they try and argue the rules with you.

Honestly, the forum has lost a lot of its edge over the past few years and I guess some of the ‘plastic boaters’ out there feel they can dip their beaks in. I remember lurking on the fringes for about a year before getting into the melee several years back and I had been blue water shipping for over a decade at that point. It was a little more foreboding then I guess but way more interesting in my opinion. Some good threads get going here and there but it’s become a kindler gentler gcaptain forum and I guess that is kind of inviting for more people. All good things eventually come to pass.

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The posts about using the empty bottles were bad not because they were posted by a non-professional but because there were uninformed AND from a non-pro.

Often non-mariners can shed light on topics under discussion.

As far as WAFIs, 99% might be clueless idiots but there are a few out there that might be more knowledgeable about certain topics then we are here.

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Well i sure wish they’d post more and help shut up the frakking dumbasses that seem to be the most vocal when they come out of the woodwork.

Maybe I’m getting grumpier as I age but the idiocy… it gives me Forest Whitaker eye man.

Any chance of some new ruling from admin that at least makes the “professional mariners” sub-forum a free fire zone when the inept and non-pros spout off with “wisdom?” We have “scuttlebutt” here for the posting of “stupid shit” after all

Sure but the questions are:
Where do we draw the line?
How do we monitor and enforce the rule?

Fair enough… just a thought @john …long day dealing with 1st of the month idiocy from the office gets me feeling especially rancid when people that think buying a boat and a fancy captain hat makes them knowledgeable about all things nautical (too closely related to cubicle captains I guess). Though I did get some amusement at the thought of his boat breaking in half from cutting holes in the structure to put empty water bottles in there.

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Why go through the trouble. They provide free entertainment and tend to drift away when their harebrained theories are refuted.

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What about a status not based simply on number of posts, but also based on industry experience/credentials. Its not really meaningful to me if someone is a “Top Contributor” if they are always contributing crap but I do care when a 20-year C/E posts even if its only once a week.

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Okay. So when someone registers for a gcaptain account, they need to submit their mmd referance # to verify their credentials, resume and numbers for past employers to verify their seatime and experience? The administrators would be all over this. Or better yet they can task our most senior members like c.captain to vetting new users?

I’m assuming that’s what you are suggesting, because this is the internet, and anyone can be whatever they want to be. My pre-teen daughter could register on here and say in her profile that she’s a 55 yr old 1600 oceans master with port Canaveral pilotage if she wanted to, for fuck’s sake.
Let’s hear some other brainstorms on how to filter folks out of the clubhouse.

Plenty of seasoned mariners here post trivial nonsense and may not be as well spoken as others. Hell I may be one of them. You want photocopies of my credentials?

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Its a small world and even smaller industry. It really don’t think it would be that hard to vet someone.

There are plenty of people who come here to learn about the maritime industry who don’t have an MMD. I’m one of them (although I do have a fair amount of sea time). It’s been my experience though that in any professional forum the idiots and BSers self identify in short order. If anything could be added an “ignore” feature would be nice to have (although it may get applied more to frequent posters than the occasional WAFI!).

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There used to be an ignore option. I’ve only used it a handful of times and it was before the forum was updated, so not sure how to use it now.
This is a public forum. I personally don’t agree with being snobby about who chimes in and who doesn’t…all I know is I don’t have anything to prove to anyone here. No one should! If I had to go thru some absurd vetting thing like brownwaterguy is suggesting I would just play angry birds on the toilet instead of coming here to kill time. I won’t lose sleep over it.

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Just ignore the idiots, I for one would never submit my credentials. There’s already too much info floating around our there and keeping it secure would be nearly impossible.

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Just flag posts? How hard is it? Worked on me.

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Maybe I wasn’t clear, I was just positing that it might be helpful to have some means of knowing the “creds” behind the poster similar to where it says “Top Contributor”, it might say “Top Contributor/Master Mariner” next to your name or something similar. Its just information for the reader to process/consider/ignore, at their choice. “vet” wasn’t the right word, my thought was not to imply that anyone needed any kind of “approval”.