Editorial Review

I am Maureen Sullivan of the Bedford, MA Chamber of Commerce. I recently applied to become a DMOZ, Bedford, MA editor and was rejected. I'm not writing to complain, however, I am asking for your help.

The Chamber and the Town of Bedford are working on an economic development initiative to attract business to Bedford, MA. An accurate representation of the DMOZ links within the DMOZ Bedford category will help all who use it. At present there is a significant percentage of links that are erroneous within this category. (i.e. some links have never belonged in Bedford, some left Bedford years ago). Chamber staff members have requested corrections and updates for over 3 years. These have included community service organizations and non Chamber members. We would like to see an accurate and rich collection of Bedford sites. Most recently, I offered to do the editorial work to correct the listings. Excluding the Hanscom AFB super-category, which also belongs in Lincoln, MA (and should also be linked in this partner town), the Bedford sub-categories have been virtually ignored and are stale.

I am asking DMOZ to review the current editor's work and find out why good sites with unique content, sites that conform to DMOZ guidelines are repeatedly ignored for inclusion and why some sites that never belonged in Bedford, MA continue to remain mis-listed. I would be very pleased to provide the current editor with a clean-up list.

Will you please help fix this?
Thank you for your attention.

Suggestions are not ignored. They may not be processed yet but that is something completely different.

If you know of any websites that shuld not be listed in that category please make an update request on DMOZ and tell us why the website should be listed somewhere else. An editor will process the request and based on the content of the website decide if teh request will be processed or rejected.

Volunteer editors do as much work as they wish within the scope of their permissions. There is no editor 'assigned' to Bedford but some 200+ editors have universal permissions and can work there if they want to. Indeed, I can see that somebody was working there during this year.

Will you please help fix this?

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If you believe that Bedford deserves a dedicated editor, by all means apply again being sure to provide complete answers to all questions. Our editor guidelines and a look at existing listings should help you to write acceptable titles and descriptions .

If you don't want to do that, please use the update listing link at the top of the category page to request amendments.

pvgool said:

Suggestions are not ignored. They may not be processed yet but that is something completely different.

If you know of any websites that shuld not be listed in that category please make an update request on DMOZ and tell us why the website should be listed somewhere else. An editor will process the request and based on the content of the website decide if teh request will be processed or rejected.

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This exactly what I have stated in the original post and what we have done several times over the past 3 years. Also, as stated, invalid sites are listed under this category. Sites that have never physically existed in Bedford, MA. http://www.dmoz.org/Regional/North_America/United_States/Massachusetts/Localities/B/Bedford/

All one need do is to look at the date last updated on the sub-category to see how out of date the editorial work is on many sub-categories. Concerning the business and economy, there are very few businesses and the entire list can be checked in several minutes with a Whois and a phone call. I have personally called each suspect business listed to confirm their Bedford, MA location> Several have stated that they do not have a Bedford, MA location, moved or never had a Bedford, MA office...

My point is that the editor is not doing her / his job in allowing bogus information to propagate. Adding a site is a review process and I can respect that all of our recommendation will not be processed, however, in 3 years none have been processed and we have nominated, good, unique, community oriented sites which are non Chamber members but are significant to the community. For 3 years we have repeatedly submitted the "The Bedford Minuteman" newspaper (http://www.wickedlocal.com/bedford) and to date it is still not included. It is the proper newspaper for Bedford, MA, the only newspaper for Bedford, MA.

While the editor for this catagory will not list the Bedford Minuteman, Topix, a news aggregator from Vancouver, WA which cannot distinguish between "New Bedford, MA" a city 70 miles to our south and "Bedford, MA" is the DMOZ choice. Topix frequently post New Bedford content in Bedford. The point is the choices are poor and again, many selections in this category are wrong.

We have submitted our comments for years and the editors of this category, do not know enough about Bedford to clean it up with relevant content or do not care enough to do so.

Either, way we hope someone of authority at DMOZ takes notice.

jimnoble said:

Volunteer editors do as much work as they wish within the scope of their permissions. There is no editor 'assigned' to Bedford but some 200+ editors have universal permissions and can work there if they want to. Indeed, I can see that somebody was working there during this year.


If you believe that Bedford deserves a dedicated editor, by all means apply again being sure to provide complete answers to all questions. Our editor guidelines and a look at existing listings should help you to write acceptable titles and descriptions .

If you don't want to do that, please use the update listing link at the top of the category page to request amendments.

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Jim, I will reapply. I did read the guidelines and provided concise listing information for the requested URLs for: Bedford TV, Bedford Minuteman Newspaper, and Flavors of Bedford. The Flavors of Bedford is an informational site for an annual fundraiser. The proceeds go to public charities including the Town of Bedford schools, recreational programs and families at the Hanscom AFB. If this site constitutes what DMOZ determines to be a conflict or self-serving I will no list it or other sites of similar nature.

Thanks for the PM but you must have missed my footer.

I prefer to answer questions in the forum and ignore uninvited PMs from non-editors.

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You also seem to have ignored all of my advice ...

If you believe that Bedford deserves a dedicated editor, by all means apply again being sure to provide complete answers to all questions. Our editor guidelines and a look at existing listings should help you to write acceptable titles and descriptions .

If you don't want to do that, please use the update listing link at the top of the category page to request amendments.

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...with predictable results.

jimnoble said:

Thanks for the PM but you must have missed my footer.


You also seem to have ignored all of my advice ...
...with predictable results.

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Jim,
Thank you so much for correcting the errors in the Bedford business and economy category.
I did follow your advice and sent in a second application after reading your reply. I have included the email date/time fragment below.
Also, I have submitted the online correction for the newspaper entry in the Bedford category.
Kind regards,
Maureen


-----Original Message-----
From: noreply@dmoz.org [mailto:noreply@dmoz.org]
Sent: Monday, August 02, 2010 10:16 AM
To: bedfordlady@
Subject: Open Directory application - bedfordlady

Dear Maureen

Jim,
Thank you so much for correcting the errors in the Bedford business and economy category.

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Nothing to do with me. I very rarely do any work in the US.

I have no clue why you posted an email header. I didn't send that either.