Tripe…. Utterly indefensible! It’s sad that 9 years ago, Scuba Diving World decided to publish this crap let alone Scuba Diver Life putting their credibility on line to bring this non-issue back to life. Throwing rocks is generally not a good idea. Some of what is in this yellow journalistic attempt is true but stretched to make it seem a PADI flaw. The fact that PADI is not an association of shops and instructors is not news. They have been a private company for decades. Scuba Diver Life is a for profit organization. Dive The World is a profit-making venture. There is nothing with providing a service, entertainment and or products for a profit. Most for profit organizations are far more efficient and effective than their not-for-profit counterparts. It’s funny to me that this was the articles first attack. PADI is not a regulatory body. It can’t fine anyone. It can’t restrict anyone from calling themselves an instructor. PADI is a training agency. It designs and markets training programs. It does have the most effective “Quality assurance” department in the industry. They can even remove an instructor from teaching status for PADI. The fact that PADI has over “70% of the world’s scuba certifications” should be used as a tribute rather than holding that up for ridicule. Scuba Diver Life has 685,000 Facebook followers. Does that make them bad? The fact that so many Dive Centers around the world have elected to become a PADI center is another indication of their brand worth. Dive Centers must have PADI professionals on staff. They must agree to adhere to PADI standards of practice. Saying something is inherently bad because every vender in town likes to represent the brand flies in the face of reason. PADI has rules which have been signed on to by all their centers. EVERYBODY has rules. Laws are rules. Does anyone know people who break the laws of their communities? If the PADI rules were not reasonable, consistent, and above all, safe; PADI WOULD NOT EXIST in this litigious society. Some instructors break rules. Suggesting certification standards are not stringent enough for entry-level divers is just wrong headed. The accident rate per dives would be a nightmare if that were true. The last time I went snow skiing, there wasn’t anyone at the top of a double diamond run checking certification cards. At least certified divers have been not only casually warned of the hazards, they have been “educated”. “With the large amount of dive centers comes cut-throat competition with price under-cutting, each dive center bidding to survive in the dog-eat-dog industry” The whole argument of “cut-throat” dive competition making it difficult if not impossible to make a living as an operator or instructor is sophomoric. Force-E, my dive center, lives in the most competitive area in the United States. There is a Dive Shop (21), Dive Boat (29), or independent instructor (80+) on just about every corner. The competition is stiff. There are some that try to be the cheap stuff. We do not. Our instructors are the highest paid and the highest quality in Florida. BUY FAR! And yet, we have the 2nd highest volume of students in our two county areas. Force-E instructors individually earn over the average household income in the U.S. and many of them are part-time. We sincerely hope Dive The World, if they still exist, has learned to get it’s facts straight and how to interpret what it sees in a realistic way. Scuba Diving Life, the overnight star of the social media of diving, should pay more respect to the divers, dive centers, boats, and organizations that make our sport what it is. Skip Commagere Diver since 1958 Instructor since 1961 Force-E – founder and owner since 1976
Posted on: Sat, 29 Jun 2013 21:08:40 +0000