Hello,

some recent developments, including being warned Motions could be removed from a speed software and a speed competition if I didn't comply, make me reconsider my positions.

Circa 2010-2012, I made a community speed challenge website that was aimed at easing the life of race organisers. It would be the platform, they would be the admins of their own challenges. Users could upload one log and participate in many different competitions at once.

I never released it* because I don't have the patience to deal with support for thousands. Nowadays with the community support around Motion (thank you!), I would imagine some could be interested in joining the adventure.

I had a few requests from well known competitions to provide a website these past two years. And I'd like the opinion of smaller organisers. If you hold a local or national challenge, if you still compute rankings by hand, if you still check each log for discrepancies, I'd like to know if you would be interested.

It had charts, maps, archives, groups, competitions defined by area, by groups or more (board brand for example) and parsers for common logs. It would be free to use and free to republish on your own challenge website. It would allow all devices but organisers could weight or split rankings.

It isn't a challenge. It's a technical platform. Challenges would build on it and define their rules, their prizes, and so on.

*: If you have a wireless Motion, you have the lightweight version of it. =)

"being warned Motions could be removed from a speed software and a speed competition if I didn't comply,"... are you serious! After all you have done for this community in making a device that supports our sport. Unbelievable !!!

"
some recent developments, including being warned Motions could be removed from a speed software and a speed competition if I didn't comply, make me reconsider my positions."

Could you be more specific about this ? Being responsible for gps-speedsurfing.com i do not recognize this discussion in anyway.....

Sure, I'll forward it to you. This plus the deletion of Facebook comments asking about your new product specifications and approval rating have me worried.

Hi Julien,

I've received the forwarded email and to be really honest i think you have to solve the issues described in a more professional way. Based on the information you have sent me these issue are not in any way related to gps-speedsurfing.com, but i do recognise the pattern of communication and the way you handled the orders of Motion devices. A significant amount of money is part of this discussion and i would advise you to sort this out with the author of the email.

I would like to point out our previous statement we have made about the current GPS Devices on the market and the ones supported by us:
"We would like to emphasise that the introduction of the COROS multi-sport watches is an extension to the current set of supported devices at GP3S, the support for all current approved devices will be continued."

The way you started this thread could lead to misinterpretation for both the Teamchallenge and GP3S platform !

I was vague.

Anyway here's the gist of it then : the creator of a speed calculator received 5 devices at discounted prices for an event and like all devices of that time, they grew black lines. And like all devices of the time, I would replace them. Mid-September, he asked for a refund. I explained, like here, that I was currently broke as **** and that I couldn't but would still replace the devices when trials would be confirmed. A week ago, I was told in clear terms that if I didn't refund it, oao support would be removed from his software and by extension from a competition.

It might be true or it might be scare tactics but it made me realise a big vulnerability for which I already have a solution in my archives. So I'm gauging interest. I'll see if smaller competitions are interested, on top of the current two main competitions.

I also dislike the current state of the sport. 10 years ago, there were dozens of small events and anyone could compete for a small local challenge. Most of these died because organisers grew tired of managing them. I'd like to bring them back. Allow anyone to create his small regional challenge without any technical knowledge.

Hang in there Julien. Stuff like this will always happen for "the little guy" who does not have deep enough pockets to respond to things like this. They probably have a lawyer (or five) while you are on your own.

Even though I don't participate in these challenges, I would like to go on record to recommend (or demand) that they just keep their pants on and be patient to let you sort this out as you are able. You are not trying to con them or cheat them. Your offer seems reasonable, and we can appreciate that it takes time to do what you have been doing. All on your own nickel.

That part is fine. He'll get the refund and that will be it. It's the realisation that this could even be put into the balance that threw me off.

It would be awesome if the topic could concentrate on the main bit as the vague first sentence was just to explain my sudden change of stance as many knew I held this website in the archives : it's the first thing I disclaim when talking with competitions.

I have a couple of Motions that also developed black lines. While those lines look disturbing at home, they are barely noticeable outside, and almost invisible in bright light. Numbers can still be easily read, and the logging works 100% perfectly. Julien has offered to replace the units, but I really see no reason to bother him with this. Even with the lines, these are still hands-down the best GPS units I have ever owned or made.

The demand by the GPSResults owner for a refund appears extremely unreasonable. He bought the units for use at Luderitz, and judging by the lack of earlier complaints, they probably worked perfectly fine there. Compared to what those competing at Luderitz have to spend to sail there for a week or two, the cost of 5 Motions is very low. Requesting a refund now is pretty ridiculous. Threatening to remove .oao support from GPSResults deserved descriptions that would probably be censored here. It should also be noted that Manfred Fuchs, the GPSResults author, has no authority to threaten the removal of Motion support from GP3S. Apparently, GP3S uses GPSResults to analyze uploaded files, but the GP3S team has been looking into alternatives already, partly because GPSResults can be extremely slow when analyzing large, high-data rate GPS files.

I cannot say that I am surprised by the behavior, since I have also had interactions with the GPSResults author that can only be described as rather unpleasant. This is very much in contrast to interactions with Julien, which have always been great.

I wrote GPS Speedreader because I did not want to wait forever to analyze large GPS files in the available software, including GPSResults. I released it to the public because others felt the same way. I never intended it as a full replacement for the older existing software, which still has many functions that are missing in GPS Speedreader. But perhaps it is time to re-think this, and put a bit more effort into GPS Speedreader. If anyone would like to switch from GPSResults to GPS Speedreader but needs functions that are available only in GPSResults, please let me know, and I'll look into adding the functionality. Either send me a private message, or add a comment here.

Hi Julien most of the speed competitions in Australia use KA72 for the data analysis, a competition group is set up by/on KA72, for example the November Hour of Power, or Lake George, also results can be extracted from it, eg our NSW gps series and the Australian nationals freerace.

Your platform sounds interesting, as the number of motions used in Australia is growing, we should look at it here. I think it will be another year or so though before we have wide enough motion use for the competitions, still a lot of bt31s and the gw52/gw60s being used.

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Dezza said..
Your platform sounds interesting, as the number of motions used in Australia is growing, we should look at it here. I think it will be another year or so though before we have wide enough motion use for the competitions, still a lot of bt31s and the gw52/gw60s being used.

My understanding of Juliens first statement was that his proposed platform would allow the use of Motions or any other existing device.

As Dezza says above Australia is very reliant on KA72 for data processing. Many of us used RealSpeed in the old days but KA72 has generally made things easier. Boardsurfr's GPS Speedreader was a welcome addition to the processing options, as it is super quick and offers direct posting to GPSTC.

I personally would welcome a platform for developing local comps. As we would like to develop a Foil only local comp.

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boardsurfr said..
>>> But perhaps it is time to re-think this, and put a bit more effort into GPS Speedreader. If anyone would like to switch from GPSResults to GPS Speedreader but needs functions that are available only in GPSResults, please let me know, and I'll look into adding the functionality. Either send me a private message, or add a comment here.

Good thinking Peter, unlike you I was surprised by Manfreds action here. Although we've had disagreements with him about the way the hour should be calculated, I didn't think he'd do something like this.
I was going to pay for a GPSResults progam to cover the odd instance GPS Speedreader didn't have the needed function, but obviously now I won't.
One thing I miss is being able to search for gybes that are too wide. The proximity circles are helpful but only work on 50m separations.
I'll try and think of others.

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decrepit said..
Good thinking Peter, unlike you I was surprised by Manfreds action here. Although we've had disagreements with him about the way the hour should be calculated, I didn't think he'd do something like this.

Let's not be too hasty to jump to a conclusion as to who is right and wrong here. It is an issue for Julien and Manfred to resolve, not us.
Both these guys have put a huge amount into our sport for very little financial return. I for one am appreciative of this.

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tbwonder said..
>> Julien and Manfred to resolve, not us.

Agreed, and by the sound of it, Julien has resolved it

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Both these guys have put a huge amount into our sport for very little financial return. I for one am appreciative of this.

Agreed again, that's why I'm surprised by Manfred's action, although as you say we don't have Manfred's side of the story

I'm sure he had good reasons to do this and I hold no grudge. The important bit is that there is a power imbalance here and that eight years (yep) of work can easily be threatened. Quite the wake up call.

So to get back on track, what I'd like to gauge is if current local organisers or anyone would see value in having someone handle the technical part of competitions?

Sorry Julien for going off topic.
The State windsurfing associations could be interested, but I'm not sure how well they monitor this forum.
It's probably worthwhile posting to each of the State forums

Julien we are probably a bit unsure what you are offering. Dylan and KA72 already have the ability to offer a custom racing facility within his program if you would like to check it out. He has made some setup video's located on his youtube channel. Just search for Dylan Tusler and go to his uploads.

It makes replays of the action like this:



Maybe you could check this out and advise your difference to it? Otherwise Dylan has a pretty good product available.
Cheers
Marty

Decrepit > I'll let word of mouth work as usual and I'll decide in January.

Martin > that's neat, what became of this? Noticed the video is from 2015. I tried to join Dylan's discord but my old invite link is expired.

So to clarify : the goal is to allow anyone to run a challenge without bothering about the technical side. It would allow a racing organisation, a club, a brand, a shop, you and your mates to create a challenge and let the website handle the technical end.

Got a few answers already like "well we had one but it faded away because nobody kept the ranking up to date". That's what I'd like to solve.

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MartinF2 said..
Julien we are probably a bit unsure what you are offering. Dylan and KA72 already have the ability to offer a custom racing facility within his program if you would like to check it out. He has made some setup video's located on his youtube channel. Just search for Dylan Tusler and go to his uploads.

It makes replays of the action like this:

Maybe you could check this out and advise your difference to it? Otherwise Dylan has a pretty good product available.
Cheers
Marty

GPS Action Replay have had this for 15 years.