But did want to point out that on occassion the rapid spread of info can backfire a bit.

IMHO , not enough to prevent sharing though.

Yes: Sites like Cruisemates have illuminated the “insider information and loopholes” that regular passengers don’t know but it is also gives the informed cruiser an edge even if the cruise lines eventually have to close these loopholes. It is then that sites Cruisemates have served a very valid pupose.

Without this inside information and there will always be “new” stuff, the value of sites like Cruisemates is lessened to a level of Cruising 101, or a cruise FAQ sheet and social networking site.

To be truly useful sites and writers need to provide new and innovative “inside information” to be of real value and I hope we keep doing it.

Take care,
Mike

BTW, you can still get “free miles” through cash advances on at least one cruise line I know. I get 400 per person per week.

I don’t know if your article alone had that much effect. It seems the cruise lines have figured out how to make money on every transaction on ships these days. The 3% service charge for up to $149 is stil cheaper than using most ship-board ATMs that charge a $5 service fee.

MSC Cruises came out with thermal scanners when it became known the health questionaires were a joke. I think that is an improvement.

So, my point is that there are times when exposing things has positive consequences.

Of course, as travel writers, we love to gleam out tidbits about the cruise industry. It’s our job.
And people love to post to share info they’ve gathered on their cruises.

That’s what the site is all about; sharing cruise info.

But, as I was saying, there are times when the info we’ve all shared makes the cruise line aware, and results in some things the cruise lines changing policies that were a benefit to we passengers.

Then of course, there’s also times where misinformation gets posted on message boards with malicious intent, or by well meaning journalists, that through a ripple effect, also have a negative effect.

First of all – take the “boarding health questionaire.” I have written in articles that this questionaire is basically a joke and no one should ever answer in the affirmative, because if you do they can and might actually deny you your cruise – a terrible price to pay just for being honest.

Unfortunately, the cruise lines set up these questionaires as a CYA move designed so they could say they screen passengers on embarkation – without actually having to do so.

Once we put the word out no one ever answered in the affirmative anymore, but I don’t feel bad about it because most of the time they did not deserve to be barred from the cruise, and any final determinations to do so were done cursarily without proper followup and determination.

Another thing I reported recenty was that if you really need to get off of a ship on disembarkation day or risk missing your plane you should just go whether your number was called or not.

I realize this would lead to certain amount of chaos if everyone decided not to obey the disembarkation process, but I don’t think most will. Why hurry to get off the ship if you have no place to go except the airport. I also said my experience is that all the bags are already off the ship and that they only use the color code process to maintain some crowd flow control (can you imagine 3000 people grabbing their bags and hailing cabs all at once?). I believe Mike M disagreed with and said you should contact the front desk to make sure your bags are out there and request an updated color code.

I agree with the first part, but not the second. I say if you MUST get off then do so. You will be there when your bags arrive on shore, hopefully expedited by your visit to the front desk.

We get the question about sneaking alcohol onboard all the time. I finally just answered it in a post (if people search) but chances are they will just continue to ask. I answered it in a post, but I won’t write an article about it.

There was the issue of compensated posters in another web site. We exposed that and a lot of people have been disenfranchised ever since. I think they have a right to be. I still say that was a right action on our part and the FTC eventually agreed with us.

lastly – suicide on ships. The anti-cruise industry brigade has maintained for years that every missing person on a ship was a murder thrown overboard.

I replied, no – they are almost always suicides, and I even wrote an editorial begging families not to bring suicidal people on ships. I was heavily chastised by those who did not believe that most disappearances are intentional, but now the cruise lines have a new policy of telling us what the surveilance cameras show in these cases, and it has been; suicide, suicide, suicide and suicide.

Towards the end I was arguing that lawyers were behind the cruise crime act of 2009, not “cruise victims” and that their goal was getting greater access to information to sue the cruise lines. Fortunately, the cruise crime act that passed is a reasonable compromise between both sides that I am sure will show the so-called “crime problem” on cruise ships is far lower than most of the anti-cruise crusade purveyed. The statistics reporting will show that.

The last thing on my mind is also what they were saying about the inability to get “legal justice” on a cruise ship. And now we have a fitness instructor who just won a $10,000,000 settlement against Steiner. That’s tough for Steiner, but he deserved some compensation and he got it – full jury American style. So much for “lawless” cruise ships.

There was the art auction fiascos, and now the cruise lines are not so focused on selling art at any price. They have brought those auctions back down to reality – partly because of information disemminated over the Internet.

There was also the Windjammer Cruises affair. We got very little satisfaction there, except finding out a lot more of what really happened at the end. A very interesting story in the end.

That’s it. In truth there is a lot more I would like to be saying right now, but much of it has political overtones and we all know certain topics should not br brought up in public, so. But I do hope the TSA can deal with all the new protocols they just put into place.