W
winwebsites
Is there any reason for a site not being listed at ODP in more than one and half years?
Regards
Singer
Regards
Singer
Yes. Lots of possibilities.
Go through are guidelines at http://dmoz.org/guidelines/include.html and you'll see what we list and what we list. To this, add the fact that we are volunteer editors, in some categories it can unfortunately take years before a site submission is evaluated. Fortunately, we're not a submission processing service; we rely mainly on our editors going out and finding good sites to list themselves. The submissions from the web user community is just one way we use for building the directory, and seldom the most useful one.
W
winwebsites
Thanks for providing me the information.
As we know, every online service has its own rules. But for a search engine or directory to meet the rocket growing internet service needs, ODP is growing quite a bit slow. It is a pity for most websites being ignored or rejected by this directory.
Another issue is that most submissions have not been contacted for their submission for any reason. I believe that a lot of webmasters might experience the same story as we did. We submited our sites for quite a lot of times in the past two years. None has been listed and we never get any notice of rejection. We have been keeping trying. Maybe one day, we will give up once we lose confidence for the sites to be included.
I hope dmoz might change something in the future.
Singer
As we know, every online service has its own rules. But for a search engine or directory to meet the rocket growing internet service needs, ODP is growing quite a bit slow. It is a pity for most websites being ignored or rejected by this directory.
Another issue is that most submissions have not been contacted for their submission for any reason. I believe that a lot of webmasters might experience the same story as we did. We submited our sites for quite a lot of times in the past two years. None has been listed and we never get any notice of rejection. We have been keeping trying. Maybe one day, we will give up once we lose confidence for the sites to be included.
I hope dmoz might change something in the future.
Singer
donaldb
Member
- Joined
- Mar 25, 2002
- Messages
- 5,146
Those "needs" that you mention are not our needs. We are not a service agency. We do not provide a service to webmasters. We are volunteers building a directory.
What makes you think that the ODP is growing slowly? We are adding thousands of new web sites to the directory every day. Just because your web site has not been added, does not mean that we are not adding web sites
bobrat
Member
- Joined
- Apr 15, 2003
- Messages
- 11,061
I personally am very hesitant to contact site owners. I've had a couple of sites that I really wanted to add, but there was some minor problem and in those case, I've contacted the site owner, the site was fixed and added - that was fine.
I've had other cases, where a site has been added, but the ownere has debated the description/title via email. This has led to arguments back and forth, and is stressfull and time consuming. Site owners usually have a major misunderstanding about the rules for descriptions, and want to load the descriptions with words for search engines etc. I really don't want to have to spend my time explaining this - so now I just refer people here.
I've also had webmasters try to submit multiple sites in multiple categories, and outright lie to me that they were the same person.
And all this is for sites that HAVE been listed in ODP.
I certainly will not get inot a debate with someone about why the site will not be listed at all.
>most submissions have not been contacted for their submission for any reason
This is true. And because of what has happened in the past when submitters have been contacted, we STRONGLY encourage new editors NOT to contact submitters.
Think of it, for a moment, from the editor's point of view. The submittal queue is a way (one of many ways) he find sites. Suppose a submittal is helpful? His most appropriate response is to add it, and immediately devote himself to reviewing more sites. THAT'S what builds the directory, and that's what he volunteered to do.
Suppose a submittal is not helpful: it's just (in his opinion) spam. Now, he COULD contact this spammer, thus revealing his own e-mail address ... but does this not strike you as incredibly unwise from any possible perspective?
And what could he possibly say? "stop spamming"? right, that works well. Anybody who follows simple netiquette won't have submitted more than twice anyway, according to the forum guidelines.
"please change your site to hide the following facts that helped me to identify it as spam"? even better.
No, there's nothing we can or should say, 99.99% of the time.
This is true. And because of what has happened in the past when submitters have been contacted, we STRONGLY encourage new editors NOT to contact submitters.
Think of it, for a moment, from the editor's point of view. The submittal queue is a way (one of many ways) he find sites. Suppose a submittal is helpful? His most appropriate response is to add it, and immediately devote himself to reviewing more sites. THAT'S what builds the directory, and that's what he volunteered to do.
Suppose a submittal is not helpful: it's just (in his opinion) spam. Now, he COULD contact this spammer, thus revealing his own e-mail address ... but does this not strike you as incredibly unwise from any possible perspective?
And what could he possibly say? "stop spamming"? right, that works well. Anybody who follows simple netiquette won't have submitted more than twice anyway, according to the forum guidelines.
"please change your site to hide the following facts that helped me to identify it as spam"? even better.
No, there's nothing we can or should say, 99.99% of the time.
D
dayflyer
Well as editors, I know its not your responsibility to necessarily be concerned with this. However, what if there was an automated system that at least responded to the e-mail address that is on the submission that says the site was denied or not added to the directory. It then could go on to say, please review "Our Inclusion Policy" and provide a link to the types of sites that are accepted. At least, people that resubmit but never correct the problem, they will know what happened. This would make the editors process a lot easier and reduce any opportunity for a dispute.
A site not following proper guidelines in regards to description or site title is an easy thing to fix. For instance, if you advertise on a Pay Per Click, the editor reviews the site, denies the listing if the details are not accurate or the URL directs to a page other than the one that it should, but you also get a report stating what was denied.
The major problem with the ODP for web site owners is that we never KNOW if a site has been reviewed. And also lets be honest, there are a lot of categories that don't have editors. So the poster above is somewhat right to say that its a slow process. I know site owners that have been listed within a week and others that have been waiting months just for a review. Its OK to need help...
That's what community is about, helping one another.
A site not following proper guidelines in regards to description or site title is an easy thing to fix. For instance, if you advertise on a Pay Per Click, the editor reviews the site, denies the listing if the details are not accurate or the URL directs to a page other than the one that it should, but you also get a report stating what was denied.
The major problem with the ODP for web site owners is that we never KNOW if a site has been reviewed. And also lets be honest, there are a lot of categories that don't have editors. So the poster above is somewhat right to say that its a slow process. I know site owners that have been listed within a week and others that have been waiting months just for a review. Its OK to need help...
That's what community is about, helping one another.
This subject is discussed extensively in this thread.
http://www.resource-zone.com/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=35962
http://www.resource-zone.com/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=35962
Your proposal addresses a problem that we who review sites very seldom see, at the expense of significantly exacerbating our most serious problem: serial spammers.
Frankly, we see very few sites that are "almost listable." 99+% of the rejections are permanent: the webmaster simply shows no unique content, nor indeed any evidence that he could produce it if he wanted to. And the exceptions are so rare that editors can contact them by hand if they wish. (I don't see one such site a month. That's far too few submittals to risk giving away information to spammers who want that information only to learn how better to hide their lack of unique content. And THEY represent the majority of all site submittals!
Frankly, we see very few sites that are "almost listable." 99+% of the rejections are permanent: the webmaster simply shows no unique content, nor indeed any evidence that he could produce it if he wanted to. And the exceptions are so rare that editors can contact them by hand if they wish. (I don't see one such site a month. That's far too few submittals to risk giving away information to spammers who want that information only to learn how better to hide their lack of unique content. And THEY represent the majority of all site submittals!
>>A site not following proper guidelines in regards to description or site title is an easy thing to fix.
Absolutely -- we correct it so that it meets our guidelines. We don't reject sites because they haven't submitted a proper title or description.
Absolutely -- we correct it so that it meets our guidelines. We don't reject sites because they haven't submitted a proper title or description.
W
winwebsites
What I mean is it will be better to have a short message like "Your site is not listable now. Please read : http://dmoz.org/guidelines/include.html and try again later." to warn the submitter. This will not only remind the webmaster to fix his site, but also reduce the unnecessary web traffic to ODP.
I believe that the number of review sites will also decrease a lot for the limited editors each day if the system is introduced.
Singer
I believe that the number of review sites will also decrease a lot for the limited editors each day if the system is introduced.
Singer
I can understand why you'd believe that. And in fact your site MIGHT even fall into that category. But (1) Less than 0.1% of rejected sites fall into that class, and (2) given a site that is not listable, only in exceptional cases would an editor continue reviewing it to see if it might be made listable -- instead, we reject and go on. (As I didn't review your site any further than to see why it wasn't listable) Why would we do otherwise? ANYTHING ELSE DOESN'T CONTRIBUTE TO BUILDING THE DIRECTORY. Site feedback is a service to webmasters, and we serve surfers. only. period.
Many people have suggested lots of ways we could distract the community from its primary goal to serve other ends. What is hard to understand is -- the community has a goal that is large enough to consume all its effort. It is not going to get involved into any other Good_Cause, whether feeding the hungry, healing the sick, converting the infidel, or defenestrating Bill Gates.
If you have another goal, start your own community, but keep your mitts off of ours!
Many people have suggested lots of ways we could distract the community from its primary goal to serve other ends. What is hard to understand is -- the community has a goal that is large enough to consume all its effort. It is not going to get involved into any other Good_Cause, whether feeding the hungry, healing the sick, converting the infidel, or defenestrating Bill Gates.
If you have another goal, start your own community, but keep your mitts off of ours!
W
winwebsites
I could not understand well how ODP makes money by just serve the web surfer. If it is ODP's goal, it should do what Google has done - having the largest resources and powerful searching function. Google now has 3,307,998,701 web pages listed!
As I know, a lot of samll search engines and directories live on the advertising or other services like site submission, selling the listings, etc. When some of these search engines grow to be a competitor, they might be eaten by YAHOOs and GOOGLES.
No matter how the development strategies they have. Marketing is always going with the service - grab as many users as possible. ODP seems to go a different way.
Do I care about too much?
Singer
As I know, a lot of samll search engines and directories live on the advertising or other services like site submission, selling the listings, etc. When some of these search engines grow to be a competitor, they might be eaten by YAHOOs and GOOGLES.
No matter how the development strategies they have. Marketing is always going with the service - grab as many users as possible. ODP seems to go a different way.
Do I care about too much?
Singer
- Joined
- Mar 28, 2003
- Messages
- 5,872
The ODP doesn't make money. It is not a commercial venture.
Why should ODP want to do what Google does? It's already being done by Google. We're not a competitor of theirs; we aim to serve the web surfer in a different way from how they do it.
winwebsites, you may understand more where we're coming from if you read http://dmoz.org/socialcontract.html .
Yes, we are always happy when people notice our distinctive features and unique contributions to human culture. And, being volunteers, we don't make much money at all. But in personal growth, satisfaction from personal achievements, participation in a unique community, many of us find it's worth it.
I have a filter program running where my optic nerve enters my brain which causes all promotional material to look like blank screen. It's configured to display the site or company's own product or service only in Business or Shopping categories and to block promotion of third parties no matter where.
A second filter removes material available elsewhere on the web unless it's collected and presented in a unique and useful way.
If after application of those two filters a site looks like a blank screen, I deem it to have no unique content.
A second filter removes material available elsewhere on the web unless it's collected and presented in a unique and useful way.
If after application of those two filters a site looks like a blank screen, I deem it to have no unique content.