Callimachus
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Damnit Hutch, even I can't find Las Vegas on a map of Utah using hands, feet, flashlight and a magnifying glass. Now if I use a map of Nevada ... ;p
Editors with Conflict of Interest??
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Damnit Hutch, even I can't find Las Vegas on a map of Utah using hands, feet, flashlight and a magnifying glass. Now if I use a map of Nevada ... ;p
Eric-the-Bun
Curlie Meta
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hutchenson has sort of got it right - Googling for Las Vegas, Utah I came across a Real Estate site with the following text:
Oddly enough a search for Las Vegas, Arizona produced results including exactly the same site with the text
regards
. Can't argue with that can you?
Oddly enough a search for Las Vegas, Arizona produced results including exactly the same site with the text
hmm obviously Las Vegas either moves arund a bit or there are a lot of them!
regards
hutcheson
smoke and mirrors my friend. One of those pages is even a redirect. I know of sites with unique content that cant get listed because they are affiliate sites. Have been directly told that by an editor. Now you are saying that each page is judged on its own merits? Your view of wikipedia is slanted IMHO. As someone who has seen their content scraped into wikipedia you need to be sure of cause and effect. Wiki is the worlds biggest scraper site. Not saying it doesnt have original content but your coming at it from the wrong angle.
smoke and mirrors my friend. One of those pages is even a redirect. I know of sites with unique content that cant get listed because they are affiliate sites. Have been directly told that by an editor. Now you are saying that each page is judged on its own merits? Your view of wikipedia is slanted IMHO. As someone who has seen their content scraped into wikipedia you need to be sure of cause and effect. Wiki is the worlds biggest scraper site. Not saying it doesnt have original content but your coming at it from the wrong angle.
The site that is a redirect isn't listed anymore, thanks for bringing it to our attention.
<added>
Site in an ODP context is not always equivalent to url/domain name. Sometimes a url will host many sites on pages or subdomains that are unrelated to the owner of the url - think ISP's providing free hosting in the form myfakehosting/~yourusername, where we list each subdomain. Some sites are spread over multiple domains - think companies marketing to multiple countries, or targeting different market segments where we list the main url and let the company do the linking to their sub sections.
</added>
As for wikipedia, I have no opinion one way or t'other - I avoid the site as much as possible (as in fact I do anything named after a tram at Honolulu airport
)
The unique content may not be immediately visible, no one is going to scan every page in a site looking for one page of unique content. Lets say you suggest a site to a tourism/lodging category - the first thing that is checked is the lodging information to see if it adds value to the category (does it list places available to stay that are not already listed, does it add more information about properties that is not available on the properties own site (think ratings, reviews, facility comparisons between different properties). Note these may not be enough in and of themselves for a listing, but they are indicators of unique content, so don't write a site with these features and expect it to be an automatic listing.
Category building is not the same as site reviewing, although there is a lot of overlap. Normally we list the root url of a site when reviewing a site, but when looking for information to populate a category we are more interested in the unique content, even if that content is on an otherwise unlistable (or already listed elsewhere) site.
<added>
Site in an ODP context is not always equivalent to url/domain name. Sometimes a url will host many sites on pages or subdomains that are unrelated to the owner of the url - think ISP's providing free hosting in the form myfakehosting/~yourusername, where we list each subdomain. Some sites are spread over multiple domains - think companies marketing to multiple countries, or targeting different market segments where we list the main url and let the company do the linking to their sub sections.
</added>
As for wikipedia, I have no opinion one way or t'other - I avoid the site as much as possible (as in fact I do anything named after a tram at Honolulu airport
)No but when those unique 'multi-page sections' are suggested to their appropriate cats and not added one must raise their eyebrows at single pages being added to dmoz because you say they are 'unique'. As for hotel directories one wonders how any of the many sites listed ever managed to find their way in then since as you say
viewing the many sites with nothing but database pulls or copy and paste text they clearly offer nothing over the actual hotel sites but manage to get listed. Yes i note your comments on reviews etc but this is evidently not the criteria most of the time. And if thats not the criteria what does that leave?
This is without touching on networks where each domain within a network gets listed.
No site is guaranteed a listing, and we are not interested in "fair play".
We have one focus, the web surfer who is looking for specific information.
Site suggestions/recommendations are reviewed if and when an available editor wants to review them, and they are added to the Directory at our sole discretion, for our own purposes.
We are always interested in having sites that don't comply with our Guidelines pointed out to us for investigation, as some do slip by us occassionally, and part of our job is quality control.
Abusive editors are another matter. We don't tolerate them and appreciate possible abusers being pointed out. If you have suspicions, then PM a meta editor with the details and they'll investigate it, but, do not assume that just because your site hasn't been listed, that there is editor abuse.
Your site suggestion may be one of the thousands of junk sites that we normally just delete. There is a big difference between what you think of your site suggestion and what we think of it, .
We have one focus, the web surfer who is looking for specific information.
Site suggestions/recommendations are reviewed if and when an available editor wants to review them, and they are added to the Directory at our sole discretion, for our own purposes.
We are always interested in having sites that don't comply with our Guidelines pointed out to us for investigation, as some do slip by us occassionally, and part of our job is quality control.
Abusive editors are another matter. We don't tolerate them and appreciate possible abusers being pointed out. If you have suspicions, then PM a meta editor with the details and they'll investigate it, but, do not assume that just because your site hasn't been listed, that there is editor abuse.
Your site suggestion may be one of the thousands of junk sites that we normally just delete. There is a big difference between what you think of your site suggestion and what we think of it,
.This is where we may be having a problem, does this 'unique 'multi-page sections' stand alone as providing the best authoritative information on the subject, or is it just another rewrite of existing material? Whether it would be considered as seperate from the main site is dependant on how closely the 'section' is aligned to the main subject of the site. A site on SEO with a section about the owners horses might get two listings. A site about SEO with information on how to design web sites would not, because they are both about the same subject - Web_Design_and_Development
That said, we ask that you (the generic you, not you personally) do not suggest such sections. We are not going to bar a site for suggesting 1 section of unrelated content to an appropriate category, but the things I see are people trying to get us to list every single page of the site. For that reason we ask that only the one suggestion be made for the entire site, not one for each section.
Editor listing guidelines are not the same as the site suggestion guidelines, we expect editors to know what is appropriate to list according to the guidelines. The reality is that most people who suggest sites do not bother to read and understand the guidelines, so their multiple suggestions are normally wrong. We wish that wasn't the case, but people are basically lazy, itreally takes weeks to get a real garsp on the complexity, much less the individual exceptions, and people want it done in 20 seconds, so thats all the time they take to suggest a site.
(To prove this, scan the forums and see how many posts you can spot here asking for clarification of the guidelines)
As I told you in a PM you sent me about these examples. Those are worthy deeplinks intended to help the disabled web surfers who may need that kind of assistance, and they are placed in the proper categories for that.
We do not care about the site owner, we are building a Directory for web surfers only.
As I also explained to you, those aren't mirrors, those are deeplinks to specific unique content for the disabled.
There is no conflict of interest by an editor, I would list those myself, and I have no websites at all, am not affiliated with any website, and don't edit in that area of the Directory. They seem to be perfectly logical deeplinks intended to help the disabled.
We do not care about the site owner, we are building a Directory for web surfers only.
As I also explained to you, those aren't mirrors, those are deeplinks to specific unique content for the disabled.
There is no conflict of interest by an editor, I would list those myself, and I have no websites at all, am not affiliated with any website, and don't edit in that area of the Directory. They seem to be perfectly logical deeplinks intended to help the disabled.
chaos127
Curlie Admin
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I would imagine that whenever the sites were added to the category, each link was the most useful information that the editor could find for that particular airport. If you think there are better options which would make those deeplinks redundant, then why don't you go ahead and suggest them?
Given the number of editors and the number of categories within the ODP, it's far more likely that categories with the appearence of "low quality" are in that state due to a lack of editor attention over a period of time, rather than any deliberate malicious intent.
Given the number of editors and the number of categories within the ODP, it's far more likely that categories with the appearence of "low quality" are in that state due to a lack of editor attention over a period of time, rather than any deliberate malicious intent.
yes you also missed the point in the private message and didnt reply to the last one. You even quoted a totally separate site.
Nobody said the sites were mirrors. I said they had mirror placements. Each in the main airport cat and then in the disabilitily cat. This would no raise eyebrows if it was a single site. But here we have multiple sites under the same ownership. They are not unique in an area like travel where many sites do the same thing. yet they alone manage multiple listings. In the sub cats the information isnt even theres, its taken from the generic site as in the example above. So you may well argue that it wasn't a big deal that the editor didn't use the best and original url for placement but when he does it multiple times for the same network its stretching credibility to say there is no bias. In reality commercial sectors are rife with bias.
I did not want to get into a round of naming other peoples sites. If they are listed then good luck to them. But i am trying to illustrate that the idea as hutcheson tried to say, that sub listings are done by editors for pages they come across on their own and think worthy of a listing, is just not true.
Nobody said the sites were mirrors. I said they had mirror placements. Each in the main airport cat and then in the disabilitily cat. This would no raise eyebrows if it was a single site. But here we have multiple sites under the same ownership. They are not unique in an area like travel where many sites do the same thing. yet they alone manage multiple listings. In the sub cats the information isnt even theres, its taken from the generic site as in the example above. So you may well argue that it wasn't a big deal that the editor didn't use the best and original url for placement but when he does it multiple times for the same network its stretching credibility to say there is no bias. In reality commercial sectors are rife with bias.
I did not want to get into a round of naming other peoples sites. If they are listed then good luck to them. But i am trying to illustrate that the idea as hutcheson tried to say, that sub listings are done by editors for pages they come across on their own and think worthy of a listing, is just not true.
Meaning your site is worthy but hasn't been listed, so that proves that there is rampant editor abuse? If, however your site suggestion is listed, then all is well and we won't hear from you again.
Same song, different singer.
Here's something I can tell you about that category though. There is no resident editor in it or anywhere near it, that I can see, so that means there are 200 to 300 possible editors who can edit there, not just one, so it's kind of hard to imagine that all of those are corrupt in not listing your site.
A more likely reason is that your particular site suggestion is the type of site we won't list, or that an editor just hasn't felt like, or gotten around to reviewing yet.
Same song, different singer.
Here's something I can tell you about that category though. There is no resident editor in it or anywhere near it, that I can see, so that means there are 200 to 300 possible editors who can edit there, not just one, so it's kind of hard to imagine that all of those are corrupt in not listing your site.
A more likely reason is that your particular site suggestion is the type of site we won't list, or that an editor just hasn't felt like, or gotten around to reviewing yet.
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You are ofcourse free to have such an opinion but as has been stated in this thread there is no bias.mybanman said:
Within DMOZ editors decide if a site is worthy.mybanman said:
Worthy sites are listed.
So sites that get rejected or removed are by definition not worthy in the aspect of having a DMOZ listing.
These sites can ofcourse still be worthy for their owner, their visitors and in many other aspects.
Yes, that is one of the main aspects of DMOZ. Editors will only "work" where and when they want it themself and will only do the "work" they are interested in.mybanman said:
Looking at the pool of suggested sites is only one of many things an editor can decide to do or not to do.
guys you are making my case for me. Nice!
Once you argument relies on personal abuse your position is lost. I made a series of valid points and instead of directly addressing them, because clearly you cant, you decide to make a personal attack based on your own BIASED assumptions that I never once mentioned. So you have self-proven editor bias. I could not have hoped for a more conclusive ending.
Again a comment that decides not address the points raised but to imply I AM BIASED. That’s brilliant. I have given a great example but you sling mud and not facts. Quite scary for anyone hoping DMOZ really is an unbiased directory run by reasonabl and rational editors.
This was a pure gift. Never once did I mention my site. And I don’t have a site with anything to do with airports.
So not one of my points could you reply to!!!!!!!!!!
This thread is about editor bias. I have given a good example of it. Your only reply is to say my suggestion is a site you wont list. I haven’t suggested a site.
Honestly this would be very funny if it wasn’t about a serious subject.
Once you argument relies on personal abuse your position is lost. I made a series of valid points and instead of directly addressing them, because clearly you cant, you decide to make a personal attack based on your own BIASED assumptions that I never once mentioned. So you have self-proven editor bias. I could not have hoped for a more conclusive ending.
Again a comment that decides not address the points raised but to imply I AM BIASED. That’s brilliant. I have given a great example but you sling mud and not facts. Quite scary for anyone hoping DMOZ really is an unbiased directory run by reasonabl and rational editors.
This was a pure gift. Never once did I mention my site. And I don’t have a site with anything to do with airports.
So not one of my points could you reply to!!!!!!!!!!
This thread is about editor bias. I have given a good example of it. Your only reply is to say my suggestion is a site you wont list. I haven’t suggested a site.
Honestly this would be very funny if it wasn’t about a serious subject.
chaos127
Curlie Admin
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As I'm sure has been said before, if you have proof of editors failing to follow the guidelines, then please file an abuse report at http://report-abuse.dmoz.org/ . If you do not have proof, then you're just wasting everyone else's time by moaning here without specifics.
If you replace "worthy" by "meeting our site selection criteria", then this would either be poor editing, or abuse -- either way we would like to take corrective action. If you have proof, please provide it. If not, please stop making such allegations.
I suspect that what you're actually seeing is the combined effect of the (relatively small) number of editors, the (large) number of categories, and the (very high) rate of site suggestions by the public (including large amounts of "unworthy" spam we have to wade through). Given those numbers it's not surprising that there are some categories haven't been editing for some time, and that contain sites that were listed some time ago. Both the editing guidelines and the sites themselves can have changed over time, meaning that currently listed sites, may not be deemed suitable for listing if they were to be reviewed again today.
You, and any other members of the public, can help us find and deal with those by using the "Update URL" link on the category pages, or posting specific sites in the "Report Hijacks, Dead Links..." thread here at RZ.
chaos127
Curlie Admin
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Actually, I think it was explained why those may be appropriate listings now, and also why it's most likely that there were appropriate listings when they were originally made.
Lets suppose for a moment that their continuing existence in the directory is down to systematic editor bias by an editor who happens to be involved with that network of sites. Perhaps you could explain why not all of those access guides are listed there? Additionally there is only one editor before you get to UK level (and I can personally vouch for him not being associated with the sites). Therefore if this is down to a biased editor, he/she also has permissions in http://dmoz.org/Regional/Europe/United_Kingdom/Transport/Aviation/Airports/ and all its sub-categories. This begs the question why not all of that network of sites are listed in the individual airport categories...
To conclude, thank you for pointing out a potential problem, though it almost certainly wasn't due to any abuse on the part of the editors who listed the sites.
Lets suppose for a moment that their continuing existence in the directory is down to systematic editor bias by an editor who happens to be involved with that network of sites. Perhaps you could explain why not all of those access guides are listed there? Additionally there is only one editor before you get to UK level (and I can personally vouch for him not being associated with the sites). Therefore if this is down to a biased editor, he/she also has permissions in http://dmoz.org/Regional/Europe/United_Kingdom/Transport/Aviation/Airports/ and all its sub-categories. This begs the question why not all of that network of sites are listed in the individual airport categories...
To conclude, thank you for pointing out a potential problem, though it almost certainly wasn't due to any abuse on the part of the editors who listed the sites.