In Reply to: So Cal Dive Industry posted by Firewalker on September 26, 2007 at 17:44:19:

Many of the very people that were profiting greatly as PADI was systemically debasing and devaluing the academic approach to education and were also cheerleading PADI because they introduced so many divers to diving are now the same shops that PADI has chosen to sell out to keep up with their very own earnings per share. The LDS has out lived its useful life as far as PADI is concerned. Naturally you won't get anyone to confirm this conclusion at PADI HQ, but their actions very clearly demonstrate the direction they are heading.

In some sense many of the local dive shops have only themselves to blame, they were shortsighted in their tacit approval of PADI's downslide, so much to the point that they are complicite in their own self demise. The LDS's went along with PADI's ridiculous approach to training so long as it allowed them to get more students into their shops to buy more masks, fins & snorkels. Now the marketing guru's at PADI figured out that they no longer needed a middle man and took their product directly to the consumer and sold out the LDS. This is equally shortsighted on behalf of PADI, but it will take a while for the long term effects of this decision to be felt at the PADI shareholder level. I'm confident at that point there will be yet another marketing gimmick to sell more c-cards. Sadly, the LDS is reaping what they sowed, PADI is simply exploiting their "distributors" for the sake of corporate profit.

Regards