I'd definitely take a PLB on board since I've seen some reports regarding various cruise ships having an emergency where the crew/captain didn't call for help immediately upon discovering the emergency. One report was a substantial shipboard fire and another was a grounding incident. Captain and crew were visibly panicked and not in charge of the situation. In one of the examples, the crew would not let anyone near the communication devices. Scary! In a major emergency, I wouldn't want to wait and see if the captain was going to put off calling for help in order to try and handle things himself (to save the cruise line the negative media exposure or whatever). I'd be activating the beacon, and looking for a ship to shore SATphone to try and raise the USCG! I'd want the whole world to know about our problem.