Ending status checks - a good decision

Man....this bites.

I understand the decision made but I also submitted my site and it wasnt found when asked about it.

http://www.resource-zone.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=37963

I resubmitted on May 1st and was waiting for June 1st to see if you had even recieved it this time.

I guess I'll just keep checking to see if gets listed.

Why cant there be a confirmation email when it is recieved by dmoz and then an acceptance or denial email when decisions are made.

Very small directories can do this and I think it would save the editors and the members submitting sites alot of heartache. And would solve alot of problems.

Just a suggestion....

PGZ

If you look around the forum you will find the suggestion is made several times a week, and you will also find various answers as to why it will not be happening.

A couple

http://resource-zone.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=5734&highlight=status+email+suggestion

http://resource-zone.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=8462&highlight=status+email+suggestion

http://resource-zone.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=27535&highlight=status+email+suggestion

http://resource-zone.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=27535&highlight=status+email+suggestion

bobrat said:

If you look around the forum you will find the suggestion is made several times a week, and you will also find various answers as to why it will not be happening.

A couple

http://resource-zone.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=5734&highlight=status+email+suggestion

http://resource-zone.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=8462&highlight=status+email+suggestion

http://resource-zone.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=27535&highlight=status+email+suggestion

http://resource-zone.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=27535&highlight=status+email+suggestion

Click to expand...

Now that was alot of reading........LOL

Point taken.... I will go to the corner now....LOL

I'll just keep checking as I said before.

Thanks for the reply

PGZ

After reading the postings on email returns (as listed above), it is clear that there are many reasons against some sort of email system.

As a suggestion, but by no means a commendation (as this idea probably would not work either), a thread could be set up where site submitters could see if their submission has been rejected. By this, I mean that the thread is read-only (only editors can write to it), and the thread only showed if submission were unsuccessful (people can search the ODP themselves to find out if the submission was successful).

This way submitters know that their site is unacceptable for the ODP. Otherwise there is no way of them knowing it has been rejected (I beleive this to be the case, but please correct me if I am wrong).

Anyway, as stated earlier this is just a suggestion, and I am sure that there would be many issues involved with such a function.

Please comment with opinions.

Such a thread would be much and much to large. What information would you have if you see a thread with several 1000 of sites being rejected each day..

As a suggestion, but by no means a commendation (as this idea probably would not work either), a thread could be set up where site submitters could see if their submission has been rejected. By this, I mean that the thread is read-only (only editors can write to it), and the thread only showed if submission were unsuccessful (people can search the ODP themselves to find out if the submission was successful).

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I'm not quite sure I'm following your thought process. If the thread was read-only for non-editors, how would they ask if their suggestion had been rejected. And if they were able to ask, then that would pretty much be reopening ourselves to status checks which we're not going to do. On the other hand, if you are suggesting that editors manually list every site that has been rejected as it is rejected in anticipation that someone will want to know, that would be prohibitively unfeasible as well as being undesireable from an ODP POV.

That type of thread would be impractical to maintain because no one editor could see the thousands of sites accepted or rejected each day therefore in order for it to work, each editor would have to post to that thread each time they edit.

As it is only a very tiny minority of us ever visit these forums.

Not to mention the size of that thread

You're talking about thousands rejections a day, using a variety of different tools, for a variety of different reasons, so the idea is impractical.

Further, note that a substantial number of these are "pro forma" rejections of partially duplicative submittals -- the kind that (if you remember reading a few dozen threads of our old status check forum) the majority of submitters seemed to have forgotten making. So if we actually did this, most people would be misled into thinking their site had been rejected when it hadn't.

As has been mentioned before: our goal is spend more time on the sites that are worth listing, not tracking the ones considered not worth listing, so this is not a direction we'd want to go even if it weren't impractical and deceptive.

Status Checks

Although I can see how status checks infringe on the good use of editors' time, I wonder how a site submitter can now determine if the site is in queue or is never going to be listed for some unknown infraction. I have a client site, which is a professional real estate development justifying a listing, however, it has not to date been included. There is no listed editor in the category. How do I now determine if the site has been discarded because the developer has other projects, or if it is still waiting for editorial review? Will the ODP editors now proactively notify submitters if their site has been rejected?

Additional note: Further reading shows that this has been discussed, however I don't see a solution proffered. I am speaking about valid sites, not sites with mirrors etc. dmoz is a very important link into google search engine placement for Internet business. How do we solve this without negatively impacting the ODP editors? I don't have an answer, I'm seeking one. Perhaps a very clear list of what will get a site rejected will be helpful in the interim--for instance, 'no address, and this odd one I've run into before which involved a real estate company with multiple developments--'Because the mother company was listed, the secondary unique developments were rejected even though they were in different locations around the country.'

chersauer said:

Although I can see how status checks infringe on the good use of editors' time, I wonder how a site submitter can now determine if the site is in queue or is never going to be listed for some unknown infraction.

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When a site is suggested to the directory there is a confirmation page acknowledging a successfull submission. Once successful reciept has been made it is up to a volunteer to review the site. If the site meets the guideline criteria for the category it was submitted too it will be listed, otherwise it will not. There has never been a way to tell if a sites is "never going to be listed for some unknown infraction" because we have never disclosed the reasons for a site rejection.

chersauer said:

I have a client site, which is a professional real estate development justifying a listing, however, it has not to date been included. There is no listed editor in the category.

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As mentioned many times throughout the forums and in the FAQ, any editor with permissions in higher categories can edit in its subcats and there are hundereds of editors who can (and do) edit anywhere in the directory they take an interest. Not having a *named* editor is irrelevent in terms of review. Everyone with a business site feels it is justified a listing. The reality is there are dozens of reasons that do not justify a listing and only one that does-Content that is both useful and unique for the benifit of the users of the directory.

chersauer said:

How do I now determine if the site has been discarded because the developer has other projects, or if it is still waiting for editorial review? Will the ODP editors now proactively notify submitters if their site has been rejected?

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Not sure I understand what you mean by *Developer*? The owner of the site has other projects that have sites being submitted perhaps? Of course if there are related sites for the same company only one will be considered. If you are meaning an editor when you say *developer* then NO. Sites don't get automatically discarded. They sit and wait for a review, and once done will either be moved, deleted or listed.
Editors will not notify submitters of rejection (nor listing for that matter) and communication with a site submitter is strongly discouraged. Communication with site submitters regarding site submissions almost always turn ugly. Ugly enough where threats have been made towards editors, spam attacks on launched on editor emails, etc. It is my opinion (shared by many) that short of completely changing focus, deleting the site and starting over from scratch a site that is not listable usually couldn't be changed to become listable.

More on that

The developer I referenced is the real estate developer. You mention that ODP doesn't share why a site is rejected. So what are your thoughts, now that site status will not happen, on actually sharing a reference document that does detail the reasons for rejections? In this way, you don't need to contact anyone (which isn't happening now anyway, and which I agree is lost time) and yet the submitters have a more comprehensive guideline for submitting to dmoz directory? It seems that such a guideline would satisfy the needs of both--at least to a partial degree. It could decrease your submissions, and/or improve the quality of the submissions so that ODP editors are not wasting time, and submitters are not left in the dark. Site developers are often ignorant or confused as to the listing guidelines of multiple directories and search engines. Sometimes the reason for rejection can be corrected. Your thoughts?

You should be able to determine if your website is eligible for a listing (and if so, where) by studying some of our publicly available documents.

Submission Guidelines
Real Estate Guidelines
Lots of other stuff

Because the mother company was listed, the secondary unique developments were rejected even though they were in different locations around the country.'

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Put another way, if you have spread the information about one company over several sites, we consider it to be one site, and only one URL should be suggested. If you have a legal fiction of separate companies, we may still consider it to be one company which only justifies the suggestion of one URL.

These may also help

Regional Category Editing Guidelines

Sites Generally Not Included

a reference document that does detail the reasons for rejections?

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hutcheson has already explained this in some other threads, but we don't look for reasons to decline a website, we look for reasons to accept it.

There's really only one - useful and unique content.

Of course, if its useful and unique content is swamped by irrelevent noise or user hostility to the point where it's not easily found, it won't be listed.

>How do I now determine if the site has been discarded because the developer has other projects?

If you know the client has other projects, then before even submitting it, you have an ethical and professional obligation to a client to tell him that the site will be rejected for that reason.

chersauer said:

It seems that such a guideline would satisfy the needs of both--at least to a partial degree. It could decrease your submissions, and/or improve the quality of the submissions so that ODP editors are not wasting time, and submitters are not left in the dark.

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As mentioned in this thread buy other editors, those guidelines have always been available. The problem is not many submitters bother to ever read and attempt to understand them. There really is no reason to change the way it is already presented. You can either choose to read them or ignore them. If one reads
them, one should already no if a site is listable or will be rejected before submissions.

chersauer said:

Site developers are often ignorant or confused as to the listing guidelines of multiple directories and search engines. Sometimes the reason for rejection can be corrected. Your thoughts?

Click to expand...

I agree that sometimes a rejected site could become listable, it just doesn't happen that often. Most of those sites that are borderline are not simply rejected. They are either left in unreviewed pending changes or moved to an editors bookmarks and can be watched for changes that make it listable.

"Site developers are often ignorant or confused": Not much of an excuse in my book. Before I became an editor, I suggested a family website to several directories and search engines to promote the birth of my son. I had no clue what I was doing (barely able to build the site using the stupid proof web builder provided by my ISP) but had no problems with any of them. Why? I read each of their guidelines before clicking the "Submit" button.

Of course that is just my opinion, and I am one of those who doesn't do anything until I fully understand its consequences. I won't even take a road trip until I have completley studied all the various routes I can take and know every turn by heart with out the map

I personally feel that providing no information to the site owners about the status of the application would make it look as a government agency.

I understand that what we are trying to do is to save editorial time in adding or editing the content rather than replying to queries. But if there was some other way.

Would it be difficult to setup a login for the users who submit site, where the users can see the status of the application. It may have some items like when the site most likely appear, if rejected, the reason. Having a system will lessen the need for people to wait with no idea whether the submission has gone through or not. Personally, I dont care if there was a rule that you will know the status by 2 months or say 3 months.

I waited for 2 months after submission, still don't have any idea of the status of the submission.

Currently, I am not sure whether the application didnot go through or not! ( I have seen threads in here stating that they submitted the info and after few months DMOZ said that those were not submitted. I donot know whether these people are lie'ing.)

As has been answered over and over. It is very unlikely that system will be build to see the status of a suggestion either by email or in any other automated way. Such a system is of no use to the DMOZ, the editors or our customers/users (and no, people suggesting sites are not our customers while suggesting the site).

usmledoc said:

Would it be difficult to setup a login for the users who submit site, where the users can see the status of the application. It may have some items like when the site most likely appear, if rejected, the reason.

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It's not a question of difficulty. It is a question of what is needed for the betterment of the project. The ODP is not a listing service. Sites that are submitted are a very small part of the big picture and only 1 small resource editors use to build a category. The *submission* is a suggestion, that the site might be able to benefit the project. In some cases, that is true and the submission has saved an editor time in locating it on their own. In many, many more cases the submission offers nothing beneficial but also saved the editor time in finding that information out.

usmledoc said:

Having a system will lessen the need for people to wait with no idea whether the submission has gone through or not.

Click to expand...

And what does that knowledge serve? You already would know that the suggestion was sucessful recieved based on the receipt of the confirmation page for the submission. If you were told the site was rejected, what would that mean? If you were told it was accepted and listed, then what? What if you were told it was still pending a review? The answer to all three should be the same-carry on with business as usual and continue your other site promotional strategies.

You are never going to find information on "when it is likely to appear" because (a) no site is guaranteed a listing and (b) no one can predict when a volunteer editor will perform the review.

For the majority of rejected sites, the submitter knows why it should be rejected -- he KNOWS when it's a VSTORE or HotelNow doorway. He KNOWS whether he already has fifty-six fraternal mirrors of the site online. He KNOWS if it's an AdSense billboard. He knows if it's "consumer info" for a product he's never even experienced or a "travel guide" to a place he's never even read a magazine article about. If he can't recognize promotional bilgewater with keywords relating to a subject he knows nothing about and text borrowed from half-a-dozen other sites possibly created by equally ignorant marketroids -- then whatever else he'll be doing with his life, it's a moral certainty he'll be unable to help us build the ODP!

All he DOESN'T know is how we saw through his disguise, and how long it took us.

And it is in our best interest to give that out, making it possible for him to compare which disguises are most effective ... AGAINST US?

Despite what some submitters say, and what more seem to think, we aren't ALL ... THAT stupid. And we're a community, not a committee: we share knowledge, not ignorance.