Good point about the acceptance of the solo diving cert. Not everyone does. I have studied solo diving (SDI’s) but I’m not trying to get a cert at this time. I already am doing many dives solo. But these are usually dives where I spend 90% of my time 20 feet or shallower. Maybe I’m a fool but if my air supply fails I figure I don’t have far to go to get to free air again. There are a couple of places I have wanted to go for years and I have given up finding someone from DFW that wants to do it. The dives will be much deeper (possibly up to 100ft) and I’ll be taking a pony bottle with me. But I’m not taking a solo cert. The reason is there are no rules against solo diving or there’s no one to check my solo cert when I get there anyway. So I don’t see much reason to pay the extra bucks to get a cert no one will ever see but myself. I wouldn’t get a solo cert unless I was planning to go somewhere they allow you to dive solo and they check for it. And I’m not at this time. I want to go to Bonaire sometime. And I want to do SHORE dives. (Boats suck!) Most divers around here are not in good enough shape to do shore dives like that. So I’ll probably have to go alone when I get around to it. I expect at least part of the time to find someone to dive with when I get there but I won’t let the lack of a buddy stop me. I’ll get a solo cert if they require (and accept) it at the resort I choose.
I think it’s funny PADI teaches against solo diving while their own instructors normally dive solo on training dives. (I see it all the time at local lakes/quarries and in my own OW class.) But when they see the potential for making money from selling solo certs they suddenly change they attitude.