CloudAhoy

I've carried a hikers GPS since I started flying lessons, oh so many years ago. At the the time GPS of any type was a rarity in GA. I'd turn it on, toss it in my flght bag in the backseat and track my lesson. CFIs were astonished to see confirmation of brilliant clearing turns, perfect patterns, etc. and if you believe I could/can fly that superbly......

Anyway, other than the 3D track, which is really cool, a cheap hikers GPS will do the same when overlaid on google maps. Or your aviation handheld.
 
Too little functionality for the price they are asking. If it was like $20/year, or $2/mo, I would keep it and forget it. But for $70, it's a bit too much. Also, if they could allow KML uploads, or have an Android client, I'd consider paying more than $20/year.
 
If he really wanted to make money all he had to do was trademark the concept of a post-flight debrief and threaten to sue any flight instructor who dared to debrief their student.
 
skyking3286 said:
Well, they really made a mistake with this one, at least for those of us who are low-budget fliers. They are going to start charging for it in December and it's a really steep cost. $70 a year, minus a few discounts. For $99 a year I get a full glass cockpit, all the USA charts updated, flight planning and DUATS from Voyager. The point is that the cost/benefit is way out of whack for CloudAhoy. For the majority of pilots who struggle to fly less than 50 hours a year, it's not worth $2 or $3 a flight to get something that a GPS gives you for free.

It was a wonderful product. They really need to just charge upfront for it, something like $19.99 for lifetime, and save themselves all the record keeping of subscriptions. I notice that other GPS trackers go for ten bucks on the iTunes store.

Want to kill General Aviation? Pretend that every pilot is a member of the one percent. And charge accordingly.
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Yes I have been using it for over a year as student Pilot I don't see any reason to pay $ 70.00 a year for it . So I will stop using it on December 2 , 2013 !
 
No such luck here. I love the idea of this app. However, I have tried it in multiple planes on iPad and iPhone and only once did it log the trip (and that was just pattern work). I'm trying again today!
 
Is anyone here going to pay the $70? I hope this guy is taking some of the free market research we are giving him.

I'll be removing the app from my devices come 12/2.
 
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I used it a lot early on until I moved my logbook over the MyFlightBook. While it doesn't provide the level of analysis that CloudAhoy does it does provide a flight track.
 
Cloud Ahoy is a nifty app, but I simply played with it for fun and not out of ANY sense of trying to achieve some real utility. It was fun to get the app to work correctly, and it worked most of the time, and it was kind of cool to see my 3D tracks from training flights, but I looked at the tracks and then just moved on.

Nothing wrong with charging for one's hard work, but the price point doesn't match the value of the use.
 
I would pay for the product if it were available not as a subscription, but as a per-flight small purchase. I'll pay a buck or two to debrief a flight. As I don't fly regularly, I don't want to pay for something I'm not using.
 
jjflys said:
Is anyone here going to pay the $70? I hope this guy is taking some of the free market research we are giving him.
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No one at all, since he's already said it's going to be $45. My guess is they're taking some of that free market research and doing something with it.

Probably not enough, but something.
 
jjflys said:
Is anyone here going to pay the $70?.
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Yep. I've been using CA since it was released. As an instructor I use it as a teaching/debrief tool on almost all of my training flights. It provides way more than just the flight track or "bread crumbs" to overlay on Google maps.


Mike
 
I'd been using it to track some of my training flights but beyond that I can't see using it that much.

I'd probably have paid < $4 for the app up front. I'd probably just go ahead and give him <$20/year to keep using it but for $70 it just doesn't do enough for me.
 
Since I've used it more than once while it was free, I'll subscribe for one year at $45.

I always knew that there would come a time when the business would need revenue to cover the costs.
 
Jim Logajan said:
Since I've used it more than once while it was free, I'll subscribe for one year at $45.

I always knew that there would come a time when the business would need revenue to cover the costs.
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My thinking too. Not sure if I'll renew after the first year though. I very occasionally use debrief, but use it to keep track of loggable time all the time (my plane is a renter's dream -- non-functioning Hobbs!)
 
I got thinking about this. From the developer's standpoint, this kind of makes sense. He's probably been riddled with emails for the last several years suggesting improvements, identifying bugs, servers going down etc., all for a hobby project. Maybe he got bored of the project and doesn't really want to continue to support it. So based on the 80/20 rule he prices it so that the folks who really use it will continue to pay, but the folks who create the most customer support issues will likely drop off.

He probably has thousands of users now. He may end up with only a couple hundred subscriptions after the subscription service. $14,000 a year (let's say an even $10k after expenses) should provide enough incentive to maintain the site for the folks who really want it, while cutting down on customer support issues.

$10k is nice flying money.

For the folks who are upset, I suppose the other alternative for him would be to just shut it down. I suspect he's done some usage analysis and determined how many users he thinks will continue to use this, versus who's going to bail. All things being equal, I'd rather serve a small number of "high-value" customers, than a large number of $2.99 customers.

While I agree that $70 a year doesn't seem like a good value compared to apps like ForeFlight, it's important to remember that CA doesn't really have any competitors from the flight debriefing perspective. Yes, there are other ways to do it, but they are cumbersome compared to CA.

It's kind of like airplane parts. $300 for an oddly shaped chunk of metal doesn't seem like a good value, until you realize that it is the only thing standing between your airplane being airworthy or a lawn ornament. There are folks who will find value in CA at $70 a year, but it's not everyone.
 
Brad Z said:
While I agree that $70 a year doesn't seem like a good value compared to apps like ForeFlight, it's important to remember that CA doesn't really have any competitors from the flight debriefing perspective. .
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Since the price/value ratio is being discussed it needs to be pointed out that the subscription is $45 a year:

http://cloudahoy.com/learnmore.html#subs

The $70 price seems to have been discarded.
 
Looks like they backed down from $70 per year, and now it's $45/year for everyone and not just for 1st year.
 
Cloud Ahoy goes subscription

Looks like Cloud Ahoy will no longer be a free App. Just got an email from them today that they are going to a subscription format at $45 per year. ( think that's it). That's the price to debrief, which I think means to view your track, speeds etc.

Was a nice app. Not sure I'd need it just now at $45 per year. They seem to be presenting it as an instructional tool. I just thought it was fun but really didn't use it that much. hope they do well.
 
Re: Cloud Ahoy goes subscription

it was fun while it lasted,guess flight aware will have to be my go to flight tracker.
 
Foreflight should buy them and include it on the professional version.
 
texasag93 said:
Foreflight should buy them and include it on the professional version.
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That's what I thought. Don't know that they need to buy 'em, they just need to add a breadcrumb feature.

Aviator1945 said:
I agree as a matter of fact I was going to call Foreflight and suggest that !
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Please do! The more people they hear it from, the more likely it'll happen.
 
While the price for CloudAhoy is a bit steep, when you look at MotionX's GPS HD app for only $1.99 it seems like a steep cliff up to what CloudAhoy wants to charge. I do like the various things you can get from CloudAhoy, but for just tracking where you went, the MotionX phone app seems to do things as well.

Also posts in real time to Facebook, which is a cheap SPOT receiver.
 
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If your not a CFI or a student, $70 is not worth the subscription... Heck, for $5 more bucks, you can buy a ForeFlight basic package... CloudAhoy is really just a glorified bragging tool used to show friends what a kick ass hobby we have :p
 
akpilot907 said:
If your not a CFI or a student, $70 is not worth the subscription... Heck, for $5 more bucks, you can buy a ForeFlight basic package... CloudAhoy is really just a glorified bragging tool used to show friends what a kick ass hobby we have :p
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Valid point, but as mentioned it appears the $70 subscription will actually be a $45 annual subscription.
 
Brad Z said:
Valid point, but as mentioned it appears the $70 subscription will actually be a $45 annual subscription.
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Ok... for 30 more bucks, you can get a ForeFlight basic subscription... Still wouldn't do it. That's almost a year of Xbox live! Wooo :hairraise: :rofl:
 
akpilot907 said:
Ok... for 30 more bucks, you can get a ForeFlight basic subscription... Still wouldn't do it. That's almost a year of Xbox live! Wooo :hairraise: :rofl:
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Pretty much explains why the kids don't come to the airport. Plus it's not a soccer-mom-approved activity to be an airport bum.
 
denverpilot said:
Pretty much explains why the kids don't come to the airport. Plus it's not a soccer-mom-approved activity to be an airport bum.
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Agreed... :sad: it truly is sad how isolated this new generation is. I rode my bike to the airport and sat in an empty hangar all day until my mom came and swooped my a$$ for not telling her where I went :rofl: (THOSE WERE THE DAYS)
 
akpilot907 said:
Agreed... :sad: it truly is sad how isolated this new generation is. I rode my bike to the airport and sat in an empty hangar all day until my mom came and swooped my a$$ for not telling her where I went :rofl: (THOSE WERE THE DAYS)
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We would take off on bikes and be gone all day. Had a couple quarters for a phone call from any readily available pay phone and the rule was if you weren't back home by the time the street lights came on, you were both grounded and probably missed dinner, in the summertime anyway.
 
The more I think about the pricing, it appears that there wasn't any market research or thought in the price point. To say "$70" and then back it down to "45" seems to communicate a throw a dart at the wall approach to pricing rather than figuring out what iPhone apps go for and their actual value. Tried the Motion GPS and it will do just fine. Even does the picket fence display. And times what your flight is. With the ability to pause, which is really nice if you stop and get out of the plane.
 
skyking3286 said:
And here is the nail in the coffin for the $45 idea....

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/flight-data-recorder-mobile/id756318302?mt=8


$5.99 gets a copy on your phone. I don't know if you need the higher priced Instructors Station to get everything to work, especially the KML Google Earth export.
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Wow... I had no idea there were so many of these!

Flight Data Recorder ($5.99, optional "Instructor Station" for Windows €44.50 or about $61)
Black Box Cockpit Data Recorder (free, but has "Pro" upgrade for $9.99)
Flight Data Recorder ($1.99)
iFlightTracks ($1.99)

There's another one called L/D Magic that seems more aimed at wingsuiters and gliding enthusiasts - It's $19.99 plus a $29.99 in-app purchase for flight data recording though.

Lots of options...
 
Don't forget the generic ones. I've had Motion-X GPS on my devices for years.

The only really cool thing about CloudAhoy was that it guessed at what you were doing. Touch and Goes, etc, and knew where runways were.
 
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