It's not often I find myself disagreeing with John Ford and Marshall, but I must side with Robin. While I absolutely agree that AIS is fantastic, the point he was trying to make is can you imagine what the waters are going to look like if it becomes as common as a DSC radio? How many people really know how to use their DSC? I barely know how to use it, only to hail another boat by MMSI or to signal distress. I've never done an all ships broadcast or even set up a broadcast group? Anyway one of the things that makes AIS so fantastic is if my chartplotter pops up with an AIS target, I find myself paying a lot of attention to it. The point Robin was making is can you advise what a moderately busy harbor would look like if every boat had AIS? They would all start to look like NY or LA, way too cluttered to make much use of. However, maybe it wouldn't really be that much of a deal anyway, because when you get in close quarters like that you pretty much go to your eyes and ears anyway? Hmm, I'm starting to talk myself out of this opinion. It's like anything else, you have to learn to use what you have and fall back to the basics. The time I found AIS to be most valuable was at night, out to sea, getting a long distance perspective on a ship prior to my ARPA being used. My AIS (Miltech) didn't get much more than 10 miles, while the Furuno on Paloma was often seeing boats at 25 miles. All good stuff! Scott Bulger, Alanui, N40II, Seattle WA