7 ms·

Three Year Cruise for Remote Workers Canceled

39 points by jbverschoor 3y ago

jbverschoor 3y ago
Previous stories: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35025337 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35025337 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35053505 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35053505 Turns out they weren't able to buy a cruise ship.
- yieldcrv 3y ago
  sucks to have to rely on other people everything here seems on the up and up, just ambitious and from people without the network to support it unilaterally I think alot of people, including this community, have sold a dream of entrepreneurship that doesnt really apply to the have nots, using the faces of people that only pretended to be have nots. And that leads to outcomes like this, where entrepreneurs are entirely dependent on investors they have zero clout with that are more flaky and noncommittal than when the entrepreneur has a ton of their own capital already in.
  - vkou 3y ago
    > everything here seems on the up and up, just ambitious and from people without the network to support it unilaterally Nothing about a brand-new cruise ship company that hasn't actually done a single cruise, doesn't actually have a ship, choosing to embark on a three-year voyage, on a rush-job retrofit vessel is 'on the up and up'. (While charging less than half of what their competitors would.) There are so many ways it can turn into a horror show. There's probably damn good reasons the investors flaked out.
    - I_Am_Nous 3y ago
      >There's probably damn good reasons the investors flaked out. The article mentions the ship they were previously going to use was decided to be "too small" but was also derided as allegedly unseaworthy. I'm sure the investors know more red flags than we do.
- crazygringo 3y ago
  That's crazy they were able to raise money and would accept payments without having the cruise ship purchase locked down. Like I can understand if there turned it to be unforeseen mechanical problems and necessary repairs hadn't been budgeted for. What I can't understand is how the company selling the ship turned around and decided to sell it to someone else for more money. EDIT: I read the article again more closely. Seems like it was actually their investment money that fell through, so they couldn't afford the ship. So the ship got sold elsewhere. Which, yikes -- you really want to guarantee you've raised that money first, before you start taking people's payments. No matter where the problem occurred, it seems horribly incompetent.
  - jbverschoor 3y ago
    They postponed + changed the departure city twice. New CEO said they'd still go and that they'd bought a ship The CEO quit. CEO told people they'll cancel New CEO said sorry for "the inconvenience" COO made sure people understood what he meant. Blames the middle east (could've just blamed COVID for that matter). Now there are two spinoffs. One by CEO, one by another employee.
11235813213455 3y ago
Those ships are massive polluters by the way
- elwell 3y ago
  Compared to energy/fuel waste from living on land? I would think the required minimalism placed upon the 'tenants' would make up for the ship's pollution. Amazon doesn't deliver to the middle of the ocean (of course there's ports though...).
  - voisin 3y ago
    > Compared to energy/fuel waste from living on land? Yes, assuming the cruise ship moves and needs many, many other boats to bring supplies like food and potable water.
    - crazygringo 3y ago
      They dock to resupply. What other boats are you talking about?
      - dghlsakjg 3y ago
        They dock to resupply in ports where they are able. In others they use tenders to bring supplies, and people, to and from the ships. Many smaller ports don’t have the ability to serve larger ships, or the quantity of ships that come in during high season so some ships will anchor off and run tenders as shuttles all day.
  - seanmcdirmid 3y ago
    A lot of them run smelly diesel generators that stink up cities they port in (ironically Seattle just a couple of blocks from Amazon). And I mean, it’s like a dead fish smell. They also run on very dirty fuel for propulsion.
    - bonestamp2 3y ago
throwawaaarrgh 3y ago
> Others say they have nowhere to return to, having sold or rented out their homes in anticipation of the round-the-world voyage, as well as jettisoning their possessions. Sounds like they're ready for vanlife. Park it down by the river, pretend you're on the cruise!
- greggsy 3y ago
  Do they even need to go on this particular cruise? What makes the experience of travelling with other digital nomads more appealing?
  - mathgeek 3y ago
    There aren’t many (any?) cruises that offer the price that this specific venture was aiming for. That’s without considering that very few cruises go for more than a week or two before you have to get off and back on.
  - crazygringo 3y ago
    Long term friendships, zero logistical hassles for the entire three years while exploring the whole world, cheap price. This cruise is (would have been) totally unlike anything else offered. If I were in a younger stage of my life, it could have been a kind of ideal experience.
- b112 3y ago
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xv2VIEY9-A8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xv2VIEY9-A8
nomilk 3y ago
As of 2023, the real linchpin for many remote workers thinking of working from a cruise is internet speed and reliability. I’ve worked from locations with patchy internet but enough to push a commit every few hours. But as soon as you need to reliably attend video meetings is where cruise ships fail at the present time. Other than that, the ability to work consistently while at sea but take a few hours to explore a new city when the ship pulls into port without needing to pack bags and check in and out of a new room is incredibly appealing
- voisin 3y ago
  > But as soon as you need to reliably attend video meetings is where cruise ships fail at the present time. Could Starlink solve this?
  - dreamcompiler 3y ago
    Yes when/if they get their laser sat-to-sat comm links working.
    - ta1243 3y ago
      They have it working, you can get coverage from anywhere on the sea, including Antarctica. It's not cheap, at least compared to how much people think internet provision costs in a typical western suburb
- AYBABTME 3y ago
  Starlink works incredibly well for my friends aboard their yachts. I think this is truly and amazingly a solved problem, as incredible as it looks to write this today.
  - idiotsecant 3y ago
    But isn't starlink still restricted to within a few dozen miles from shore where a ground station exists?
laweijfmvo 3y ago
> …now face a wait of at least several months to get their money back. The company has said it will make repayments in monthly installments, starting from mid-December and completing repayments in late February. lol lawsuit incoming, unless they company is in international waters and unable to be sued in any jurisdication
- gruez 3y ago
  You can't draw blood from a stone. What are you going to do with a judgement against a company that has no assets aside from whatever money it raised from customers?
- crazygringo 3y ago
  I mean, over three months is annoying but it's faster than any process a court would follow. And presumably the delay is related to getting their down payment on the ship back? Or other down payments made to various contractors?
nradov 3y ago
A lot of the intended passengers were retirees, not remote workers.
- jbverschoor 3y ago
  It was marketed everywhere as a cruise for digital nomads (+ tax savings!)
foota 3y ago
I had a real hard time parsing this when I thought it was about the company Cruise. On topic edit: "Life at Sea Cruises had been planning to buy the AIDAaura, a ship retired this summer by AIDA Cruises, a German subsidiary of Carnival Corp. It was due to be rechristened as the MV Lara. The company had originally slated the sale to go through by the end of September, before working on the ship in dry dock in Germany, then renovating it before sailing to Istanbul to start the cruise." They thought they could remodel a ship in 2 months?? These people must be former software engineers.
- baz00 3y ago
  Lets be fair here. Former software architects at least!
- wavemode 3y ago
  Former project managers, probably
- dghlsakjg 3y ago
  A refit period for a ship can be something as extensive as a full “remodel” of the interior or something as simple as regular maintenance like painting and a drydock for below the waterline maintenance. Given the timeline, I would expect mostly routine maintenance, and maybe some minor renovations to areas like the casino that won’t be used on a residential cruise. Yard periods are normally much better managed than software since they are massively expensive as well as a stop on revenue.

39 points by jbverschoor 3y ago

Previous stories: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35025337 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35025337 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35053505 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35053505 Turns out they weren't able to buy a cruise ship.

yieldcrv 3y ago
sucks to have to rely on other people everything here seems on the up and up, just ambitious and from people without the network to support it unilaterally I think alot of people, including this community, have sold a dream of entrepreneurship that doesnt really apply to the have nots, using the faces of people that only pretended to be have nots. And that leads to outcomes like this, where entrepreneurs are entirely dependent on investors they have zero clout with that are more flaky and noncommittal than when the entrepreneur has a ton of their own capital already in.
- vkou 3y ago
  > everything here seems on the up and up, just ambitious and from people without the network to support it unilaterally Nothing about a brand-new cruise ship company that hasn't actually done a single cruise, doesn't actually have a ship, choosing to embark on a three-year voyage, on a rush-job retrofit vessel is 'on the up and up'. (While charging less than half of what their competitors would.) There are so many ways it can turn into a horror show. There's probably damn good reasons the investors flaked out.
  - I_Am_Nous 3y ago
    >There's probably damn good reasons the investors flaked out. The article mentions the ship they were previously going to use was decided to be "too small" but was also derided as allegedly unseaworthy. I'm sure the investors know more red flags than we do.
crazygringo 3y ago
That's crazy they were able to raise money and would accept payments without having the cruise ship purchase locked down. Like I can understand if there turned it to be unforeseen mechanical problems and necessary repairs hadn't been budgeted for. What I can't understand is how the company selling the ship turned around and decided to sell it to someone else for more money. EDIT: I read the article again more closely. Seems like it was actually their investment money that fell through, so they couldn't afford the ship. So the ship got sold elsewhere. Which, yikes -- you really want to guarantee you've raised that money first, before you start taking people's payments. No matter where the problem occurred, it seems horribly incompetent.
- jbverschoor 3y ago
  They postponed + changed the departure city twice. New CEO said they'd still go and that they'd bought a ship The CEO quit. CEO told people they'll cancel New CEO said sorry for "the inconvenience" COO made sure people understood what he meant. Blames the middle east (could've just blamed COVID for that matter). Now there are two spinoffs. One by CEO, one by another employee.

11235813213455 3y ago

Those ships are massive polluters by the way

elwell 3y ago
Compared to energy/fuel waste from living on land? I would think the required minimalism placed upon the 'tenants' would make up for the ship's pollution. Amazon doesn't deliver to the middle of the ocean (of course there's ports though...).
- voisin 3y ago
  > Compared to energy/fuel waste from living on land? Yes, assuming the cruise ship moves and needs many, many other boats to bring supplies like food and potable water.
  - crazygringo 3y ago
    They dock to resupply. What other boats are you talking about?
    - dghlsakjg 3y ago
      They dock to resupply in ports where they are able. In others they use tenders to bring supplies, and people, to and from the ships. Many smaller ports don’t have the ability to serve larger ships, or the quantity of ships that come in during high season so some ships will anchor off and run tenders as shuttles all day.
- seanmcdirmid 3y ago
  A lot of them run smelly diesel generators that stink up cities they port in (ironically Seattle just a couple of blocks from Amazon). And I mean, it’s like a dead fish smell. They also run on very dirty fuel for propulsion.
  - bonestamp2 3y ago

throwawaaarrgh 3y ago

> Others say they have nowhere to return to, having sold or rented out their homes in anticipation of the round-the-world voyage, as well as jettisoning their possessions. Sounds like they're ready for vanlife. Park it down by the river, pretend you're on the cruise!

greggsy 3y ago
Do they even need to go on this particular cruise? What makes the experience of travelling with other digital nomads more appealing?
- mathgeek 3y ago
  There aren’t many (any?) cruises that offer the price that this specific venture was aiming for. That’s without considering that very few cruises go for more than a week or two before you have to get off and back on.
- crazygringo 3y ago
  Long term friendships, zero logistical hassles for the entire three years while exploring the whole world, cheap price. This cruise is (would have been) totally unlike anything else offered. If I were in a younger stage of my life, it could have been a kind of ideal experience.
b112 3y ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xv2VIEY9-A8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xv2VIEY9-A8

nomilk 3y ago

As of 2023, the real linchpin for many remote workers thinking of working from a cruise is internet speed and reliability. I’ve worked from locations with patchy internet but enough to push a commit every few hours. But as soon as you need to reliably attend video meetings is where cruise ships fail at the present time. Other than that, the ability to work consistently while at sea but take a few hours to explore a new city when the ship pulls into port without needing to pack bags and check in and out of a new room is incredibly appealing

voisin 3y ago
> But as soon as you need to reliably attend video meetings is where cruise ships fail at the present time. Could Starlink solve this?
- dreamcompiler 3y ago
  Yes when/if they get their laser sat-to-sat comm links working.
  - ta1243 3y ago
    They have it working, you can get coverage from anywhere on the sea, including Antarctica. It's not cheap, at least compared to how much people think internet provision costs in a typical western suburb
AYBABTME 3y ago
Starlink works incredibly well for my friends aboard their yachts. I think this is truly and amazingly a solved problem, as incredible as it looks to write this today.
- idiotsecant 3y ago
  But isn't starlink still restricted to within a few dozen miles from shore where a ground station exists?

laweijfmvo 3y ago

> …now face a wait of at least several months to get their money back. The company has said it will make repayments in monthly installments, starting from mid-December and completing repayments in late February. lol lawsuit incoming, unless they company is in international waters and unable to be sued in any jurisdication

gruez 3y ago
You can't draw blood from a stone. What are you going to do with a judgement against a company that has no assets aside from whatever money it raised from customers?
crazygringo 3y ago
I mean, over three months is annoying but it's faster than any process a court would follow. And presumably the delay is related to getting their down payment on the ship back? Or other down payments made to various contractors?

nradov 3y ago

A lot of the intended passengers were retirees, not remote workers.

jbverschoor 3y ago
It was marketed everywhere as a cruise for digital nomads (+ tax savings!)

foota 3y ago

I had a real hard time parsing this when I thought it was about the company Cruise. On topic edit: "Life at Sea Cruises had been planning to buy the AIDAaura, a ship retired this summer by AIDA Cruises, a German subsidiary of Carnival Corp. It was due to be rechristened as the MV Lara. The company had originally slated the sale to go through by the end of September, before working on the ship in dry dock in Germany, then renovating it before sailing to Istanbul to start the cruise." They thought they could remodel a ship in 2 months?? These people must be former software engineers.

baz00 3y ago
Lets be fair here. Former software architects at least!
wavemode 3y ago
Former project managers, probably
dghlsakjg 3y ago
A refit period for a ship can be something as extensive as a full “remodel” of the interior or something as simple as regular maintenance like painting and a drydock for below the waterline maintenance. Given the timeline, I would expect mostly routine maintenance, and maybe some minor renovations to areas like the casino that won’t be used on a residential cruise. Yard periods are normally much better managed than software since they are massively expensive as well as a stop on revenue.