Talk:Surfline

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Hi. My name is Sophia and I work for Surfline. I'd like to help improve the page, while complying with Wikipedia's conflict of interest rules, starting with the "History" section. The current history section is factually accurate, but it has almost no citations, features editorialized language like "with the hopes of being a 'category killer'", has some parts that are overly detailed, and mostly drops off around the 1990s. I'd like to propose an expanded/cited rework of the History section and have prepared a proposed draft:

History Surfline was founded in 1985 as a pay-per-call telephone surf report based on weather, the National Weather Service's buoy data, and telephone reports from young surfers that travelled to beach sites to observe the waves in-person. Callers heard a 90-second recorded message with information about the size, duration, and angle of waves at 22 California surfing locations. Surfline was founded by Southern California surfer Jerry Arnold and David Wilk. Surfline was the first significant use of technology to aid in finding the best surfing conditions. Previously, surfers used tips from local surfing stores or friends that live within eye-sight of the beach. At first, Surfline got about 900 calls per-day. Surfline hired Sean Collins as its chief forecaster in 1984. Collins played a role in Surfline's growth, after he accurately predicted wave conditions in South America a week in advance, while the waves were still six thousand miles away from coastal surfing locations. This forecast also triggered a backlash against Surfline and services like it, for overcrowding beaches with the best waves and taking the search for waves out of the surfing experience. However, interest in surf forecasting services like Surfline continued to increase. Collins later left Surfline and started a competing company called Wavetrak, that was merged with Surfline in 1990. Through the merger, Collins became a co-owner of Surfline, then purchased complete ownership in 1990. Collins helped develop Surfline's early methodologies for predicting surfing conditions, before passing away in 2011. By 1991, Surfline was providing more than one million phone-based surf reports a year. In 1992, it started distributing surf reports via fax and pagers, before moving on to internet-based services. In 1995 Surfline became an online service, offering live video streams of surf breaks in addition to written surf reports. The first live camera feed was created in 1996 at Huntington Beach. Around this time, Surfline started doing forecasting work for special events, contests, and surf magazines, as well as lifeguard organizations and government agencies like the U.S. Coast Guard. In March 2000, Surfline was acquired by surf website Swell.com. By the early 2000s, Surfline provided data for 37 beaches in California, four in Hawaii, 17 in Florida, and 20 others predominantly on the East Coast. It had 350,000 monthly visitors in 2000 and 500,000 by by 2002. By 2002, it had about 15 employees and 30 contract surfers that visit beaches in-person to provide reports on surfing conditions. Surfline developed its own software to predict waves. In 2006, Surfline installed its own buoy system to track waves offshore. Around 2007, Surfline acquired the website Buoyweather.com. In 2007, Surfline expanded its network of beach cameras and created its first Surfline smartphone apps. This was followed by the acquisition of FishTrack.com in 2012. Fishtrack.com was the Surfline.com equivalent, but for fishing, instead of surfing. In 2017, Surfline acquired Magicseaweed, a United Kingdom-based company founded in 2002 and focused on forecasting surf conditions in more than 200 countries. In 2017, Jeff Berg was appointed CEO, followed by Kyle Laughlin in 2020. In 2020, the company raised $30 million in venture capital funding from The Chernin Group. In 2021, Surfline reworked its wave forecasting engine, incorporating artificial intelligence and machine learning. It also advised the 2021 Olympic Committee on anticipated wave conditions at the first olympic surfing competition. References

Because it might be difficult to compare this proposed version to the current page, I have prepared a "track changes" type version with detailed notes here. Thank you in advance for your time. Best regards.Smackrides (talk) 21:18, 14 September 2022 (UTC)


 * Looks good! Make it so. knoodelhed (talk) 19:17, 5 November 2022 (UTC)

Impacts on Surf Culture and Services

 * Thank you for reviewing the expanded History section I proposed with a disclosed conflict of interest. I was hoping you would also be willing to review a short "Services" section I've put together below.

Services Surfline is a company, website, and app that provides surfing-related resources, such as wave forecasts. As of 2015, it collected data on more than 2,700 surfing spots using buoys, NASA satellites, data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and other data sources. It has an analytical model called LOLA that uses that data to predict surfing conditions. Surfline also monitors beaches visually using high-resolution cameras. As of 2022, it had 800 cameras. Surfline is also available as smartphone app and can record a surfing session using a smart watch and the beach cameras. Surfline's business model is a mix of advertising revenue, subscription-based pricing, and forecasting for special events or other organizations. For example, it provides forecasting services to the U.S. Coast Guard and for competitions or special events.

Surfline is simultaneously praised as innovative and criticized for commercializing the surfing experience. Critics argue Surfline has taken away the sport's mystery, commoditized tribal knowledge on waves, and causes over-crowding at beaches with the best waves. Some surfers damage Surfline's cameras to prevent others from seeing good waves and crowding the beach. On the other hand, Surfline can draw surfers to remote locations they otherwise would not have thought of.

References


 * The second paragraph is intended to be a more concise, balanced, and well-cited summary of the "Impacts on surf culture" section. IMO that section has too many editorialized quotes, citations that do not even mention Surfline, etc. However, there are good sources that do discuss the impact Surfline has had on surf culture, from both a positive and negative perspective. Smackrides (talk) 20:10, 15 February 2023 (UTC)