Are Affiliates allowed to be editors on Dmoz

chaos127 said:

What issues?

The key questions are: Is the editor failing to comply with the editing guidelines? Is the editor favouring certain sites? Is the editor connected with those sites?

Suffice to say there are plenty of meta editors who are experts in determining the answers to all three of those questions.

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Just an observation.

What if the editor is adding sites that are all affiliated without knowing. If I registered 10 domains and hosting under 10 different hosting accounts with 10 dummy LLC's how would anyone know? Not saying I do, but I have seen accounts of things such as this on sitepoint. Where people have gone so far as to say things like "if you can find even 1 site that I am affiliated with I will pay you 10k" The person was not kidding either. He is a well known webmaster who earns six figures per month. He said the 10k would be worth it to tighten up his security with his lawyers.

I am not saying this person abuses anything. I wouldnt know. He has often said he uses both black and white hat methods and diversifies his efforts. He also says he has well over 500 sites and he is looking to hve 500 more by 2007. This isnt just some kid talking either. This is a well respected webmaster.

Just making the point, an editor might not even know what he/she has done wrong. No 'expert' would be able to tell either. If you think you can, I will try and find his post where he offers 10k to find any sites that are affiliated.

Budalata said:

critic009, do you really believe that whoever can manipulate Google ? Do you really think that Google will risk his whole business by using data from DMOZ - a human edited category

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I'm not sure why you do not know this but DMOZ does manipulate Google. A listing here means a higher ranking than not being listed, AND it has been proven that it will get your site indexed faster when its first released. Its a real shot of PR.

hutcheson said:

(And there are a lot of false charges: although most of them seem to be by affiliate spammers who COULDN'T find an editor to abuse on THEIR behalf.)

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Ever consider it takes scum to know scum? It is known that criminals rat out other criminals. Its the best way to catch them. The shadiest probably know all the tricks and that is how they find these people out. I would listen to these people more than anyone.

All of this of course is just my opinion. Trying to be unbias.

I believe that what you say about the stealth affiliates is true. I say that there is no such thing as "editor abuse" -- it is all "webmaster abuse": even though some webmasters obtain editing privileges by deceit for malicious purposes, they are still abusive webmasters. And sometimes editors are fooled: "you can fool some of the editors for awhile," but you can't fool all of the editors forever. So, yes, sometimes the editor is just another innocent victim of the webmaster deceit.

And yes, we get some excellent help from people ratting out their competitors. There is nothing that gets quicker attention than help tracking down webmaster abuse already in the directory. Again, you'd be surprised how much we catch without help. But help makes a big difference.

My point is that many of the claims of "abuse" boil down to "the editor hasn't listed my site" -- when in fact it would have been abuse TO list it. Surprisingly few allegations of abuse include actual specifications of specific sites that were added and shouldn't have been. (The people who DO find those sites, bless their hearts, usually give us the benefit of the doubt ... and I try to return it.)

I'm not sure why you do not know this but DMOZ does manipulate Google. A listing here means a higher ranking than not being listed, AND it has been proven that it will get your site indexed faster when its first released. Its a real shot of PR.

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I dont want to discuss too much, just tell me please HOW HIGHER ranking you expect to obtain after listing in DMOZ? May be six? Seven ?

"indexed faster"... before three/3/ months i create entirely new cat in DMOZ and there are a lot of sites WITHOUT PR there...and still thay dont have PR; if we are talking about displaying results in Google - please, believe me, if the site is written as it has to be, Google will indexed it immediately.

Let me tell you something - Google knows better than any webmaster how worth it site is, and what there is in this site...you can spent some time viewing Google AdSense Preview Tool, and you will realize this.

Concerning our edits in ODP - till we all are humans, there will be also cheaters, and persons expecting listing in ODP to solve their problems.

Budalata said:

I dont want to discuss too much, just tell me please HOW HIGHER ranking you expect to obtain after listing in DMOZ? May be six? Seven ?

"indexed faster"... before three/3/ months i create entirely new cat in DMOZ and there are a lot of sites WITHOUT PR there...and still thay dont have PR; if we are talking about displaying results in Google - please, believe me, if the site is written as it has to be, Google will indexed it immediately.

Let me tell you something - Google knows better than any webmaster how worth it site is, and what there is in this site...you can spent some time viewing Google AdSense Preview Tool, and you will realize this.

Concerning our edits in ODP - till we all are humans, there will be also cheaters, and persons expecting listing in ODP to solve their problems.

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Much higher. Not as high as it use to from what I can see. But still much higher.

You dont see the PR because even though google knows you have a link from DMOZ or any trusted site it doesnt instantly give you the PR. Just like it doesnt instantly update the SERP's when you add a new SEO improvement.

I cant believe you...I want to, but I cant. There are reasons why some sites are indexed in days and others take months. I am not saying DMOZ is the only way. But lets say you are a new webmaster with no affiliations and no inbound links. Google will not just index your site. Please believe me. Now if that new webmaster can get a link in DMOZ his site will be in the index in days.

I do think google is good at knowing the worth of a site. I also think its smart that they google factors in a link at the ODP to calculate that worth. That being said, if they believe that the human edited dir makes a difference, they should drop the ODP and start their own. That is neither here nor their.

What you believe, or not - is entirely your job

You can look at this Google search http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=lang_en&q=knowandcan

There is a list of domains, and only one of them is a word with meaning in English. Every one domain name is indexed in Google search.

The only external links are to HTML, CSS and the company which posses them /also not included in ODP/

If you have problems with indexing with your sites in Google, try to find information about Google penalties.

But this forum is not the right place of discussing such a things.

Regards

P.S i am newbie in ODP and this is my private opinion.

"Some sites are listed in minutes and some in months" ...

It sounds like you still believe that the date of a site suggestion means something.

And it doesn't. It absolutely means absolutely nothing. Not "it doesn't mean much." Not "it has only infinitesimal meaning". It means nothing.

So long as you persist in trying to read some meaning into it, you'll remain divorced from reality. And I suspect that's a very unpleasant state to be in.

>But lets say you are a new webmaster with no affiliations and no inbound links. Google will not just index your site.

Let's not say that. Because I can't imagine who would care whether that were true or not.

But if we said that, in all honesty we'd have to point out all the innumerable people who are eager to help a webmaster promote his site.

Which, since it is also irrelevant here, might better go unsaid also.

Budalata said:

You can look at this Google search http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=lang_en&q=knowandcan

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If you want to analyze the google search results you need to search for something competitive. Not some obscure phrase like the one you show above.

hutcheson you posted at the same time as me.

I want to clear up that when I say "Some sites are listed in minutes and some in months" I am referring to google not DMOZ.

hutcheson said:

"Let's not say that. Because I can't imagine who would care whether that were true or not."

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I was just trying to point out to the previous poster that a listing here can be very important. People care very much how true that is. People know how important a listing is here. If that were not the case do you think there would be corruption, manipulation, and people coming here to rant so much?

But lets say you are a new webmaster with no affiliations and no inbound links. Google will not just index your site.

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This is not true. I created two new personal web sites this past spring, one for general writings and one hobby oriented. They had no inbound links except from each other and weren't submitted to ODP/DMOZ or indeed any other directory. I did however submit them to Google's search engine (not NOT the Google directory). Within the week Google had spidered both sites, and within 3 weeks they had gone from PR0 to PR4 and can be found easily in the first 1-2 pages of a search for their primary keywords.

While I'm sure another quality listing or inbound link is of value, they are certainly not necessary for Google to recognize your existance.

Callimachus said:

This is not true. I created two new personal web sites this past spring, one for general writings and one hobby oriented. They had no inbound links except from each other and weren't submitted to ODP/DMOZ or indeed any other directory. I did however submit them to Google's search engine (not NOT the Google directory). Within the week Google had spidered both sites, and within 3 weeks they had gone from PR0 to PR4 and can be found easily in the first 1-2 pages of a search for their primary keywords.

While I'm sure another quality listing or inbound link is of value, they are certainly not necessary for Google to recognize your existance.

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With all due respect you did not go from a PR0 to PR4 with no inbound links. That being said I am guessing whatever links you did get are the reason why you showed up in the first two pages within weeks. Getting indexed in a week or two is amazing, to then be a relevant listing within weeks with brand new sites is almost unheard of. Even when new sites are indexed they dont show up in SERPs for quite some time. Unless you have great inbound links. Which is probably the case since your site jumped from PR0 to PR4 in weeks. PR is based soley on inbound links... so for you to say you had none and the domains were brand new does not make any sense.

All of this is probably better suited for an SEO forum.

>If that were not the case do you think there would be corruption, manipulation, and people coming here to rant so much?

Actually, yes, I think there would.

People's actions are based on what they believe, not on what is true. And so long as the secret to Google success is hidden, we will have people fervently believing in all conceivable factors, from the phrases of the meta tags to the phases of the moon. And so long as some segment of the SERP perp pool believes the ODP is the secret to their success, then they'll be acting as if it actually were.

Occasionally, we have someone here pursuing an ODP vendetta based on a belief that COULD be trivially disproved with a simple Google test search. But does that even slow them down? Not in my experience.

Please, see this http://www.quoteland.com/

PR 7. Not listed in ODP. How it is possible ?

Let we stop this discussion

"chaz7979" said:

All of this is probably better suited for an SEO forum.

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You are correct.

This thread has drifted far off topic. Google's (or any other search engine's) algorithms are not of any relevance here. I am going to restate the answers given above to the original question, and close the thread.

1. Editors may be affiliated with or own web sites.

2. Editors may not edit in a way that favors their own sites or acts to the detriment of their competitors' sites.

3. If you suspect that an editor has done so, please use the "report abuse" link at the top of the category page or http://report-abuse.dmoz.org/