British vs US spelling

Is it possible that an application could be rejected because the applicant uses British English spelling in place of US English?

I recently applied to become an editor and was rejected on the grounds of spelling, but after re-reading, and checking by a colleague who's an English graduate, I can find no spelling or grammatical mistakes (I even tried MS Word).

The only hint I had was MS Word not liking my British use of '-ise' as in 'realise'.

I've come across this before, when American and Dutch colleagues would 'correct' my documents to US spelling.

I'm assuming that there's no policy within DMOZ to only use US English, but would all editors be aware of the differences? (Incidentally, I applied for a UK-only category)

I don't have an answer re your application, but I have to deal with the spelling problem all the time in category descriptions, the general policy would be to use US spelling in the non regional parts of DMOZ, but the site title is left as is using the "native" spelling. In UK areas, the British spelling would be used. In other areas it's sensible judgment, I deal with a lot of categories where I get a mix of British and US sites regarding travel, and will use a mix of spelling within the category.

I used British spelling as a child, then had to swith totally to US spelling, then moved to Canada where we use a confused hybrid of the two, so I'm used to switching back and forth. But I still end up mixing them up when I switch from one category to another, including your specific example.

Was the spelling the only issue mentioned in the denial letter? The only reason I ask is because the standard denial letter has a host of reasons why an application may have been denied, but it doesn't mean that it was denied because of all of those reasons. Spelling is one of the possible reasons. Was there any other feedback given in the comments section?

Yes, that 2 out of the 3 sites I had submitted were already in the database, in nearby categories. I eventually did find one of those, but not in the DMOZ search facility where I had originally checked. Only by browsing for similar categories did I come across it.

Incidentally, I've just applied again, and this time was rejected without any comments by the reviewer.

The sites already being listed in the directory thing is important. I know that it's sometimes hard to find the sites that you are using for examples in Dmoz itself. One littel tip when you're searching for URLs in dmoz.org is to only use the domain name in the search. Search for domain.com instead of www.domain.com, or even better just search for domain.

Sorry that I can't be more helpful, but without having seen the applications it's tough to comment. If you're going to apply again make sure that you read everything referenced in the FAQ and General Advice thread.

Yes, that 2 out of the 3 sites I had submitted were already in the database, in nearby categories.

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Tip: use Alexa toolbar. (Alexa.com. It uses Dmoz data to show related sites and categories. If there is no related sites shown by the toolbar, it is very likely that the site is not already listed in Dmoz.)

The Google Toolbar also tells you if a site is listed in the ODP directory, although Google's version of the directory is now quite out of date.