We're one of the few organizations that receives and analyzes every LNM posting from the 17 districts. In 90% of the cases, an LNM item has been in ActiveCaptain for 2 months or more before it is reported by the Coast Guard. That's the reason NOAA licenses ActiveCaptain - they wanted to be able to update their charts faster, based on changing data. NOAA cartographers get morning reports of all changed hazards reported on US coastlines. For what it's worth, we also have hazards in Canada, Bahamas, Caribbean, Australia, UK, Sweden, and throughout the world.
In a similar way, ActiveCaptain data showing a correction of an LNM, especially an aid to navigation fix, usually shows up in ActiveCaptain before the corresponding post is made in an LNM. When an aid to navigation is fixed, the hazard marker is removed. So if ActiveCaptain doesn't have the marker and another reporting service does, that doesn't mean the aid is missing and ActiveCaptain is ka-ka. It just means we received multiple-boater confirmations that the aid was fixed so we removed the hazard. The USCG doesn't know it yet so the other services don't know.
It's a pure lie that being a sponsor of ActiveCaptain means reviews are edited or deleted. All you need to do is look at the many existing negative reviews on sponsor marinas to know that we don't do that. No reviews are ever removed or edited without extreme involvement of the boater who wrote them unless they are obviously fake reviews (generally positive ones written by a marina themselves). In a handful of cases - I think it's 17 in the last 8 years - reviews had to be removed against the wishes of the boater because they violated one of a couple of simple rules. For example, you have to actually be at a marina in order to write a review on it - you can't protest their pricing by writing a 1-star review because you think they charge too much. Things like that are unfair.
We really try hard to provide the best data possible to all boaters. The nature of crowd-sourcing means you need to do some evaluation for all data especially when there isn't much community commentary on a particular marina, anchorage, or hazard. But there's no better way today at getting better, more timely information. Why else would 50 other companies be licensing our data for inclusion in their own products?
