cruisecritic
 

Ok I just read a thread that said negative remarks about a Crystal cruise were removed from the Crusiecritic web site. Who owns cruise critic? I once heard that an actual agency owns the site? I know agencies advertise on it but just wonder how much bias is on the site.

It depends on the moderator. Even though an even slight negative registers really vicious howls of protest, insults and accusations the moderator always called the first poster the problem and deletes the post and gets the poster kicked off the whole website. Banned forever and not even a warning.

It is the vicious over-reaction of the Cyrstalites that is the problem; not the innocent poster who dares utter something negative or even neutral. It is a website that demands total and slavish loyalty. Others cruise line moderators are not as biased as the Crystal one.

Don't know how moderators are chosen, but mainly it is the over-the-top reactions of the Crystalizers that set up the fire storms and those are the ones who should be getting banned for being so disruptive.

They goad you into a lot of this and then, poof, you become the "problem" and then you are gone. It is like a remake of Lord of the Flies over there.

Once burned; twice shy.

Then as you say, it must be only on Crystal, because I've been on www. Cruisecritic.com for years and have read many, many negative reviews on all the other cruise line threads.

The intensity of the loyalty of many who post on the Crystal threat on CC is astonishing. It is close to a religion as they pat each other on the back for choosing to spend their money on Crystal ships. As competition has come into the market (some from former Crystal employees working for other cruise companies) the defensive attitude has increased.

As I fly on several airlines, I also travel on various cruise ships and take resort vacations. I am not loyal to one cruise company. As I have been told that it takes many, many cruises to have status on Crystal, I know that I will never have any status with that company.

The Crystal WEB site and publications often have photos of people who have made 100 cruises with that company. Work out the numbers. It is astonishing that someone could or would spend so much money with one cruise company.

Trust me, I have been on CC for years and that doesn't just apply to Crystal. Some loyal fans of other lines can border on the neurotic.

CruiseCritic has never been a travel agency site. It originated in the old AOL, now is owned by the same folks who own TripAdvisor.

Tripadvisor and CruiseCritic are owned by Expedia, the online travel agency.

yes
 

and it really shows! I think that's why so many posts get deleted. The cheerleaders get to keep posting.

The press release when they were sold

http://www.cruisecritic.com/aboutus/...=10&pressID=38

It's always amazing how many "independent" boards are actually owned and operated by other companies, including of course FlyerTalk (which is part of a group of 100 or more owned by the same company)

There's always rules to play by when owned by somebody else, and in this case it's never say anything bad about advertising companies (cruise lines) on any of the other owned sites, or it just goes away.

Ultimately one learns from the Crystal CC posters that you really do not want to travel with these folks. They are hardly enducing to enjoying yourself if you have to travel with people like them when choosing Crystal.

All you can say is it is good they have found themselves. May their ship of fools merrily keep sailing away and leave the rest of the cruise lines to those who know better. Crystal Cruise lines is like a grease trap that sucks the undesirables out of the rest of the market and keeps them locked up for good. Good riddance.

The best value for Crystal is if one wants to observe various success possibilities if one is contemplating plastic surgery. It is a living laboratory and you get the opportunity to also see how varying plastic surgery techniques also look in photos, which is often quite alarming compared to the affect natural light.

I used to dabble a bit on a travel forum for the Cayman Islands. One time I responded to another poster's query by recommending a certain restaurant. I was stunned to learn my post was deleted by the moderator.

Turns out the restaurant in question doesn't advertise with the company that owns this "independent" board.

I challenged the moderator, and the credibility of the board in view of such tactics, and was immediately banned from the forum.

Cheers,

were lucky we dont have the same kinds of mod problems here.

i cant imagine its anything other than that.

i dont get the crystal hype. sounds like im glad i did not read the crystal forum on CC. forums for the all-inclusives there are not bad at all.

although i did get more help here on one of my questions than on CC's alaska forum.

Think of Beverly Hills on a boat, and you have Crystal Cruise Lines. They know the price of everything; but the value of nothing.

...and Seat Guru.

I appreciate FT for its relative freedom of opinion. :)

I like FT because you can be honest in your opinions, and not start a meltdown, hissy fit, flame war. People just let other people's opinions stand and not use them as launching pads for personal attacks.

FT is a good place to both vent and praise what we as individuals have found true for ourselves. And posts seem to be taken in that spirit.

Flaming posts like my own relentless attacks on Crystal speak as much for me and my petty-minded vengeful spirit, as they reflect on Crystal itself. The readers here seem to know the difference.

I have gotten such solidly good info on FT. And the Crystal Trolls have not apparently yet discovered it. They show up on other CC cruise line forums stalking anything, anywhere, anytime they perceive as negative to Crystal. And come crashing down on them. A very weird group.

None dare be the child's little voice that claims the King has no clothes without being struck down with their venomous pen. I guess that is just part of their brand protection. Wouldn't it be more productive to actually have a better product, rather than protecting the pretense they have a better product?

The Crystal cheer leaders did post over here last year and got mocked. They have it easy on CC.

One of my former bosses who retired to a life where he cruises on Crystal a great deal is having a fit over the big increase in prices for 2011. He is also afraid that they will go all inclusive which he is against because he doesn't believe in alcohol. Yes, that is what he says.

Cruisecritic is a joke
 

Check out the Celebrity Cruise lines forum on cruisecritic.com and see how the paid shills and apologists are defending Celebrity against photographs of stained furniture,filthy fixtures and rust on the ship Celebrity Summit.
They are employees.
Nothing can convince me otherwise.
I too have had my posts deleted there.

I am convinced that some people who post on CC are getting some sort of benefit from the cruise companies. Money? Discounts? Free stuff? Who knows?

I made the decision to go down market for my next cruise as the destination is what I want and the boat is just a way to get there. Crystal's food is not worth hundreds of $ a day.

We moved to HAL (Holland America Lines) ships and have been very happy with them, particularly the smaller ones. Unbelievable difference in pricing, with larger lovely cabins and far more attractive deck space and lounge areas.

I love the smaller HAL ships Explorations Cafe and Library - stunning windows and spacious compared to the ratty little space Crystal offers. They are very low key, quiet and retain sufficient elegance that one never misses whatever Crystal is supposed to offer. They have superb friendly, smiling, courteous crew.

The entertainment is not as lavish and glitzy as Crystal but it is fine and varied and that has never been a reason to cruise for us anyway. We are usually too tired after a good day in port to stay up that late anyway.

Dining experience are pretty similar, except the HAL double tier dining room with vast floor to ceiling windows and lovely decorative ceilings wins hands down over Crystal's cramped and dark oppressive space.

I am glad I sailed Crystal because now I know why I love my "dam" ships. Stick with the HAL R and S class ships and you can do many more trips with a balcony room for the price of one single, cramped "obstructed" view Crystal room.

Thank you for the advice. Seriously taken!

HAL ships even let you take your own wine aboard to either enjoy in your room, or pay a modest corkage fee for dinner.

Some of the departure ports have wine shops who will deliver to the ship. Not a drinker myself, but this is one more area where Crystal dings you badly if you are.

I watched some people sneak a brown paper bag on the back deck of the Crystal ship to enjoy their own free booze before dinner, skulking around hoping they would not get caught.

Brown bagging on Crystal. Wow! We have an office discussion (continuing) about travel. The general opinion is that most of us will be looking to make our money last longer by being wiser consumers. I'd rather take 2 or 3 trips on HAL all things said and done.

The younger folks are trending toward all inclusive prepaid vacations so they don't come home with credit card sticker shock.

Why do I get the feeling that I'm being watched posting on this subject on FT?

We found we like taking 3-4 more trips on HAL with a better and larger cabin, better itinerary, better shore excursions, and friendlier crew than one Crystal cruise.

It is stunning Crystal has gotten away with selling their sizzle and no steak for so long.

Nonsense, I hate FT! Oh, wait...

Mike

It's the case on several lines. Few are more religious than the Carnival and Royal Caribbean supporters. There are massive flame wars from cheerleaders for both lines for anyone who dares utter a negative word about either. Being "proud" of a cruise line seems absurd, I just don't get it.

We are essentially tribal people; as much as we look down at the "primitive" third world. We are fierce in our protection of our tribe, as fluid as that attachment may be. For some it is sports team and now it appears it includes cruise lines.

Ships hold and protect us. We trust them when we choose them. We are helpless in their care. And we attack to defend this special relationship when it has earned our loyalty.

There, you have it.:cool:

I am an avid reader and poster on CC. I find all the boards highly partisan with some people defending their preferred cruise line with all the venom of a grandparent whose grandchild's piano recital has been criticized. However, if you take it all with a grain of salt and ignore all the hyperbole there is a lot of good information to be gleaned on these boards regarding the ships, itineraries, service, ports, etc. To me, it's worth skimming past the incensed and highly offended posters to get this information.

but how do you know which is which?

It becomes obvious pretty quickly which posts are informative and which are worthless cheerleading or bashing.

Nearly every time I come to read this read an ad link pops for for All Inclusive Cruises. I think that is the way of the future for upper price line cruise companies.

All Inclusive pricing, open seating in the main dining room and ability to bring our own liquor on board are three things that stand out as important to us. Yes I know that 'all inclusive' means most wine, beer and liquor included, but we often have special wines that we buy along the route of our trip and want to be able to enjoy on board.

Friends who are frquent cruisers report that bar drinks on Crystal now rival New York City in pricing and a tip is added to every drink purchased.

I believe adding gratuities to bar drinks is a standard feature within the cruise industry (all-inclusive lines the exception). I believe we paid $13-$14 for a decent martini on Crystal last year. We're sailing Celebrity in a few weeks and I know from recent experience their cocktail prices are roughly the same. The shipboard credit promotion on Crystal did, however, cover all the costs of our bar & wine consumption with $250 in unused credits refunded back to us at the end of the cruise. That was a first for us! As to bringing aboard liquor, we have never had any problem with that on Crystal before (6 cruises). We have openly brought aboard bottles of Crown Royal, etc, and placed them out in our stateroom with never a peep from anyone. On our last cruise, we bought a couple of bottles of wine in Portugal before we boarded and enjoyed them in the dining room for a $15 corkage fee.

As to Cruise Critic, we sail everything from NCL to Crystal, RCCL to Disney (and everything in between)! So we're literally 'all over the map' on the Cruise Critic boards and find the intense loyalty to be a common denominator no matter which forum you visit.

I'd say you have been a bit lucky, as I've gotten a few bottles confiscated over time

On Crystal?

We had a bottle of Crown Royal confiscated once on NCL. But to my knowledge (and personal experience), Crystal doesn't have these restrictions.

We are going to take a Mediterannean cuise in October, the ship will pass thru several countries.

We are planning to stay one day before and one day after the cruise in Barcelona, Spain. I guess that I will only need Spain's visa, am I correct or not ? and does anyone know is there any website for me to check how to do the Spain's visa ?

Thank you very much for your kindly help.

What country are you a citizen of? If it's US, you do not need a visa to visit Spain unless you are there 90 days or more.

It depends on your citizenship. I find this website handy for checking my travels:

http://www.delta.com/planning_reserv...tion/index.jsp

We are US citizens. Thank you very much for the very useful information.

For those still interested in Cruise Critic on this thread..
 

Cystal Ccruise lines prices for 2011 including Alaska are out and the CC cheer leaders are defending all. An Alaska cruise on Crystal in 2011 will run a couple about $10,000. The cheer is 'it is worth it'.

How many days are you actually talking about for the Alaska $10,000 "Crystal experience"?

Does Crystal go to different ports or does it get in line with all the other crowds in Alaska.

How many days at sea is the real question where the passenger is allegedly getting the exclusive Crystal experience - what are those sea days actually worth for the extra money compared to a Celebrity, Holland America or Princess Alaska cruise where they pretty much all have the same port experience?

Are the few Crystal at sea days on these similar cruise days worth the thousands of dollars extra? Curious minds want to know.

Here is my analysis comparing a HAL Alaska cruise with the Crystal Alaska cruise.

Essentially you are getting the standard 7 day HAL cruise Vancouver to Vancouver which HAL sells for a balcony for approximately $2000 a person.

Crystal adds 3 sea days going from San Francisco to Vancouver and back to San Francisco, but once in the Vancouver area, the routes are essentially the same.

Crystal costs $6000 for their 12 trip, HAL charges $2000 for their 7 day trip.
So deduct the HAL two thousand and you have $4000 for the extra sea days Crystal takes going and coming to San Francisco, which can be a rough passage.

That is the $4000 Crystal difference - a thousand dollars a day to sit on a Crystal on the high seas, ship, after seeing the same things on a $2000 HAL ship.

How much food can you eat for that $1000 a day extra because when you sleep, the Crystal rooms are not any better than HAL rooms. So does spending $300 each those extra breakfasts, lunches and dinners for those 4 days really make it worth choosing Crystal?

Please, someone report back and tell me what a $300 Eggs Benedict tastes like on Crystal because I sure don't remember them being any different that what we get on HAL?

But for those 4 extra $1000 a day Crystal at sea days, you get (1) bragging rights you can spend that kind of money, and (2) spend those sea days with others who also don't know the difference between value and price. Huzzah, and there you have the Crystal Difference.