Platform · Social

Boats nearby, friends visible.

Automatic Identification System (AIS) shows you every vessel transmitting nearby. Friend boats can opt into sharing their live position with you directly. Rendez-vous planning compares your estimated time of arrival against theirs. That is the whole thing.

What's included Back to platform →

Scope

The minimum that solves a real problem.

I am not building a social network. The features here exist because "where is the boat I'm meeting and what is their ETA" is a problem sailors actually have at sea. Everything else stays out.

What's in

Live AIS feed — every nearby vessel with MMSI, name, COG, SOG, and position
Friend-position sharing — named contacts, opt-in from both sides, revocable any time
Rendez-vous planning — compare ETAs across friend boats given current positions and routes
Friend boats visible as a distinct layer on the chartplotter
Position visible only to the named contacts you chose — never public
Everything off by default — no automatic sharing

What's not

No rating system
No "find crew" marketplace
No public profile or timeline
No algorithmic feed
No advertising layer
No community growth metrics
No notifications designed to bring you back to the app

The stance

I am not building a community.

This is deliberate, not an oversight.

I built 32°N because I wanted it on my own boat. If other sailors find it useful, that is genuinely great — but I am not optimising for user growth, retention metrics, or a network effect that makes the product more valuable the more people use it.

The social features exist because rendez-vous planning and fleet awareness are solved more cleanly inside the platform than they are by stitching together AIS aggregators and WhatsApp. That is the whole reason. When a feature does not solve an on-the-water problem I have or can imagine, it does not get built.

"Community is organic, not a goal." That principle shapes every decision here.

Position sharing is private by design.

Friend-position sharing is peer-to-peer by name, not a broadcast to a public map. You choose who sees your position. Revoke access any time. Position data does not flow to my servers for aggregation — it syncs between the boats in the named list only.

AIS is public data, handled cleanly.

AIS is a Radio Detection And Ranging (radar)-era protocol where every transmitting vessel is public. 32°N integrates the local AIS feed from your own receiver — not a third-party aggregator. You see what your antenna receives, not a database query with paid tiers.

Roadmap

Where this is going.

v1.5 · Shipping

AIS feed and opt-in sharing.

Live AIS from your on-board receiver displayed on the chartplotter. Friend-position sharing via named contacts — both sides opt in, either side can revoke. Rendez-vous ETA comparison for friend boats with active routes.

v2 · Later

Shared passages.

Opt-in track sharing for passages so a named contact can follow your progress. Share link generates a read-only view with current position and last-known track — no account required for the viewer. Expires when you revoke it.

Read about the full platform.

The demo lets you explore 32°N without any hardware. The platform page has the five-layer picture showing where social fits alongside the chartplotter, weather, and the rest.

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