Ending status checks - a good decision

usmledoc said:

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.

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It has been said a thousand times over... follow the guidelines, submit your site, and forget it.

One day you may wake up and find a listing. Then again, maybe not. If you have a commercial site, go out and build your business instead of thinking "if I only had an ODP listing everything would be great".

There may have been a day when an ODP listing had value in search engine rankings. Those days are gone. Go pay for some quality directories. Five or six paid listings will do wonders.

I have one site that was submitted about a year ago and is currently waiting for review. In spite of no ODP listing, I've made it to #5 on Google in a pool of about 7 million pages. And that happened three months ago.

I have another site that I do on a volunteer basis. It's been in ODP for probably 7 years. The ODP listing doesn't even show up as a backlink in most SEs. So in my view, ODP has little or no impact on search engine ranking, whatsoever.

Securing a good position in SERPs is far more complex than a simple link from ODP. So, move past the ODP. You've got lots of work to do.

Cancelling Submission Status Checks

Great idea to drop submission status checks! For the most part, it's been a waste of time for editors and a waste of time for the majority of people attempting to check status since the info they usually seek is in large part information they are not privy to by ODP guideline standards or they must wait longer than their attention spans to get it. A classic "dog chases tail" scenario except it's sometimes hard to tell who is the dog and who is the tail.

These status check requests have now been brilliantly replaced by endless threads discussing the merits of the status check, creating a whole new outlet for editors and submitters to waste more of their precious time! It's catching on quite nicely!

Clearly, there is a demand for SOMETHING by submitters, something that editors can not effectively or efficiently provide nor have any desire or responsibility to provide. Someone behind the big DMOZ curtain has finally come to the realization that the status request forum was an exercise in futility. What I don't understand is why are editors WASTING their valuable time typing elaborate responses to this idiotic and ridiculous thread discussing the very thing they've realized has been a big, fat waste of their life energy?!? Do you think this topic will just die off and fade into the sunset? You're going to keep getting requests for status in the wrong places, posts from people philosophizing over the need for status checks or suggesting ideas for providing status "auto-magically", all things that you as editors have made clear you have no desire or obligation to do!

These people don't get it now and they'll never get it! Ignore them! STOP WASTING YOUR TIME and get back to editing the categories that you're now free to edit for having removed the status request forum!

Unbelievable!!!!

Do you think this topic will just die off and fade into the sunset?

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I don't think so and maybe you should have started a new thread for this.

Hmmm...let's talk about an 800-lb. gorilla: Google.

• Google provides a way to suggest your site to be spidered
• After submitting the form, you receive a "thank you" message that the suggestion has been received.
• No promises are made about when the suggested URL will be spidered, just that it will "eventually."
• There is no promise of a listing, either. In fact, the submission form says: "We do not add all submitted URLs to our index, and we cannot make any predictions or guarantees about when or if they will appear." This message is repeated on the confirmation screen.

Interesting.

Yes, I know that ODP is not Google. In Google, a program attempts to distill a site down into what it thinks it's about. In the ODP, every single listing gets a custom-crafted, human-written title and description.

I just thought it was an interesting parallel.

lkevinl said:

These status check requests have now been brilliantly replaced by endless threads discussing the merits of the status check, creating a whole new outlet for editors and submitters to waste more of their precious time! It's catching on quite nicely!

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Very nicely done. It is so difficult to pull off sarcasm over internet based communication because of the lack of non-verbal visual cues. Yet this is a key element of human interaction... perhaps one reason why so many people find it difficult to chat online.

Anyway, back to the point of the automated tracking system for users. As noted throughout many of the threads in the ODP resource zone, there are too many reasons why such a system is not desirable at this point in time (and most likely any time in the future).

However, I think a topic that may be more discussable (although may still not be possible) is a system where users can find out if their submission has not been successful. This is because it is possible to find out if a submission is successful (by searching the ODP), but no way of knowing if it isn't.

Users may be waiting on a submission without knowing that it has been deemed unacceptable for ODP, i.e. waiting in vain.

Who knows. This may be a rhetorical question (in the sense that there is no answer). One thing is for sure, I think that too many people are looking to ODP as an answer. It is not the be all and end all. It is not a commercial service, and therefore has no need to be customer centric. If it was, ODP would not justify itself and would lose it's main value proposition.

I don't beleive that the answer is the same for all three questions (refering to other threads), but i do beleive that this is a guideline that users should take into consideration when using the ODP (Heck, it could even almost be listed in the submission guidelines).

Anyway, food for thought.

evstar deluxe said:

Users may be waiting on a submission without knowing that it has been deemed unacceptable for ODP, i.e. waiting in vain.

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Waiting in vain for what? Someone to say to them: "Your site was declined and is not listable so you are now free to spam the directory with more unlistable submissions of the same site or begin making posts in RZ complaining about how evil and corrupt everyone who volunteers at dmoz.org is"?

Of course not all of them would respond like this, but many would.

The answer to all three of those questions should be the same:

What if I were told my site was accepted?
A-I would continue all of my self promotional strategies and continue to build my website by adding good useful information for my customers.

What if I were told my site was still waiting review?
A-I would continue all of my self promotional strategies and continue to build my website by adding good useful information for my customers.

What if I were told my site was rejected?
A-I would continue all of my self promotional strategies and continue to build my website by adding good useful information for my customers.

I agree that now we are becoming bogged down with endlessly trying to defend something that doesn't need a defense. It is explained in discontinuation thread why it has been done and said many times over in the forums why an automated system will never be an option. Time to move on to other subjects, so I think this will be my last post on this subject.

>Users may be waiting on a submission without knowing that it has been deemed unacceptable for ODP, i.e. waiting in vain.

No, our USERS won't be doing this. Our USERS will be scrolling through categories looking for interesting sites.

It's abuse to use the ODP to promote a site. (Obviously, the difference between "promoting" a site and "bringing the editors' attention" to it is -- whether it contains significant unique content.

But ABUSERS (ALL abusers, for some value of "all" within the limits of human error) will be...

Now for one-time abusers -- the small-time affiliate-site spammers (not comprehending that their copying a catalog from another website and advertising the products of another company, means their content can't be unique) wait in vain -- but those sites are doomed anyway, and if these people follow the submittal policies, even they are not a big problem.

What's important are the folk with five-to-five-thousand doorway promotional sites, who have a whole warehouse full of fright wigs, who are trying to figure out which fright wigs are hardest for us to spot ... waiting in vain ... yes, in the presence of laws against cruel and unusual punishment, that's precisely the right state for them.

>Ah, but there's a fourth question:

>What if I were told my site suggestion was never received?

Yes, that is a fair question. That is a "rare error". And it's not the only rare error: they can occur in the hardware (crashes) or software (bugs) or wetware (human mistakes and abuse).

From your point of view, these are all big concerns if they happens to you; but from a surfer's viewpoint all of them together (and there have been a few tens of thousands of instances by now) are mere infinitesimal fragments of the uncomplete portion of the Open Directory PROJECT. From our point of view, each instance of any of these would be a regrettable accident that we would fix (generally quickly) if we found out about.

But how can we find out about them? For POSITIVE errors, we rely on the "thousands of eyes" principle -- editors and other surfers actually using and perusing the directory, and complaining when something isn't perfect.

For NEGATIVE errors, by definition there CAN'T be a mechanism.

On the one hand, we absolutely don't want to generate two classes of submittals, the "ordinary" ones that get neglected, and the "importunate" ones that get better service because they harass editors more. (In justice as well as self-defense it must be closer to the other way around than is humanly possible.)

And more generally, NO source, trusted or untrusted, has any better a priori way of finding them beyond blind random chance.

So -- more editing, more use of multiple sources of URLs, more category reviews ... are the best solution.

That still leaves you with the underlying question: how can you compel an ODP editor to give you the extra service of double- and triple-checking your site? Of guaranteeing that it is listed if there is any conceivable justification?

And the answer has to be: There's no way. And if there were, its predominant use would be abuse by the same people that abuse the submittal system and the forums; the same people that don't mind who they trample over (surfers or editors or competitors) or what social solecisms they commit -- so long as they have more opportunities to commit egregious acts of malicious marketing for money.

Three years to wait is quite long

I am happy and sad that the status forum has been discontinued, I can understand the frustration of the moderators in dealing with this kind of thing. I have also been a mod before and I know work load builds up and doing repetive work gets old. I have great respect for the mods here.

spectregunner said:

There is also the reality that in many categories it may take an editor three years just to look at a site.

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My concern is this above. Personally if it takes three years for a site to be edited it's too long. That means that that specific category should be broken down into more categories or more editors need to be brought on board to handle the work load or moved from other areas to speed up that category. I myself applied for an editor position before, but quite honestly the application process is terrible and lengthy. I compeltely understand DMOZ's need to have quality editors in order to have a very highly professional team, but if the application process was a little less rigorous, I wouldn't mind applying again. I have submitted 2-3 sites to the DMOZ, and after roughly 18-24 months I am still waiting. This boggles the mind.

>My concern is this above. Personally if it takes three years for a site to be edited it's too long.

That's one opinion. I've argued elsewhere that the submittal date is meaningless because it is not logically or heuristically connected to site creation date. So my priorities do not take submittal date into consideration.

The ODP has a very democratic approach to priorities: You vote for whatever priorities you want to work on, and I vote for whatever priorities I want to work on.

>That means that that specific category should be broken down into more categories or more editors need to be brought on board to handle the work load or moved from other areas to speed up that category.

Um, you've entered Fuhrer-fantasy mode.
"Alles Achtung! Poland must be invaded immediately!"

OK, go ahead. Invade Poland. Invite anyone you want to help. Take whoever wants to Go East. But ... there's no way to draft cannon fodder. And ... in the ODP, the peasants have just as valid a notion of morality as you do -- they have just as much right to impose their "shoulds" and "should nots" on you, as you to impose on them.

You're still thinking in terms of buying slaves and passing them out to the various whipmasters. It doesn't work like that. Everyone's a volunteer, nobody is EVER "brought on board" do do anything but what they volunteer to do; and anyone who convinces us we can trust them to do something good -- (we don't care what) is invited in. If we have five editors for the "Madonna" category and none for "Mahler" -- then lots of Madonna sites will be reviewed, and Mahler will be neglected.

Is this a problem?

Actually, it's not, not at all. If there is no surfer interested enough in Mahler to go through the effort of reviewing sites and describing them well, then apparently Mahler isn't very important to surfers, and the editors ought to be focused somewhere else. If this sounds somewhat Panglossian, it's because it's the same tautology: what is the definition of where editors OUGHT to work? It's not where submittals are deepest! It's not where webmasters want them! It's where the editors want to surf today.

>I myself applied for an editor position before, but quite honestly the application process is terrible and lengthy. I compeltely understand DMOZ's need to have quality editors in order to have a very highly professional team, but if the application process was a little less rigorous, I wouldn't mind applying again.

The application process is nothing more or less than what editors DO. Find appropriate sites, categorize them, describe them. That's all. That's why it's such a good application. "Show us what you'd do: if we like it, we let you do that, and more of the same."

If you had ENJOYED filling it out, you might be an ideal candidate.

>I have submitted 2-3 sites to the DMOZ, and after roughly 18-24 months I am still waiting. This boggles the mind.

Oh, it's much worse than that. There are probably hundreds of thousands of listable sites that old that haven't been reviewed. Some of them have been submitted; others haven't -- not that that matters to us one way or another. Of course, we have no way of picking sites out by age if we cared about that (good thing we don't).

And you know, nothing I do tonight will change that statistic. So ... I might as well do what I think will be most helpful for surfers.

Just like ... any editor, any day.

I'm a little taken back by your reply. Though I do thank you for a reply.

Being a moderator before I understand that each person has their own priorities, and I am glad to see this in the ODP as well.

As for the editors being slaves and the submitters being the kings, ummm I think we've miscommunicated here. Of course the editors choosen for specific categories are choosen due to experience, knowledge or whatever and obviously they are interested in the category they chose. I guess maybe now thinking about it more you can't move editors from one category to the other. However, the two-three categories I did submit too are pretty popular and I was told they are backlogged, so which would mean that there is an interest in those categories. And I am certain that they are important to surfers as well. And if they are backlogged then more editors should be accepted into a category that already has an editor. When I applied I noticed that one could only apply for a category that did not already have an editor.

Actually, the first two times I filled out the application I did really enjoy it, it was fun, different, meaningful and it was something I really wanted to do. I spent much time in making sure everything was in order, unfortunately I was rejected both times. On the third try I was less than enthusiastic about it because I felt why I am even bothering to do this again. I understand that the ODP cannot accept all applicants and that you are seeking high quality people, but again honestly the application process is too lengthy for a volunteer position.

I have a very high respect for the editors on this site as well as moderators on other sites. I know what goes on. I was part of a moderating team for three years on a site with several thousand users. The forums I moderated were most posted to and I spent 3-5 hours a day looking through them. This, all on a voluntary basis, so really I understand.

techiemon said:

Of course the editors choosen for specific categories are choosen due to experience, knowledge or whatever and obviously they are interested in the category they chose.

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No, you don't understand. Editors are not choosen for specific categorie. Editors make the choice themself where and when to edit. If they want to edit in some parts of DMOZ they have no rights yet they ask for these rights in a simmilar way as new editors apply.

techiemon said:

When I applied I noticed that one could only apply for a category that did not already have an editor.

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This is not true. Some categories are not open for new applications, but the fact that an other editor is already listed for a category isn't one of them.

pvgool said:

No, you don't understand. Editors are not choosen for specific categorie. Editors make the choice themself where and when to edit. If they want to edit in some parts of DMOZ they have no rights yet they ask for these rights in a simmilar way as new editors apply..

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I think that techiemom understands this. I think that techiemom might have been trying to say "Of course the editors accepted for specific categories are accepted due to experience, knowledge or whatever and obviously they are interested in the category they chose."

techiemon said:

I'm a little taken back by your reply. Though I do thank you for a reply.

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I cringe at most of hutcheson's replies. I think this was a bizarre analogy. Accusing people of entering Fuhrer-fantasy mode is not the best way to start off a post, especially when you're the type of person who refuses to use emoticons, but if you read the post carefully it does make sense

And if they are backlogged then more editors should be accepted into a category that already has an editor. When I applied I noticed that one could only apply for a category that did not already have an editor.

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Actually it doesn't work like that and thinking like that is maybe related to your rejections.

A category that has a big backlog is usually one with a lot of listings and often a spam-magnet. A popular category for submitters. Hence the backlog. The worst thing that can happen is to throw a new editor into a situation like that. It is hard enough to learn the ropes without the pressure of hundreds of unreviewed sites.

One important initial task is to learn the difference between what is listable and what is not. Suppose you have a category with 10 sites waiting and you get it wrong - not a huge task to reverse any mistakes. Suppose you have 1000 sites waiting for you - think of the incredible amount of work to put that right.

So you start in a backwater category, small and with a handful of sites to list. No mass spammers, fairly straightforward decisions to make. You prove yourself and move up to a slightly bigger category and do the same. When you have enough experience and have proven yourself capable of making good judgements then you are ready for the categories with big backlogs. By that time though you may come to realise, as many do, that you are more interested in other sections of the Directory, and that original category you wanted to help in becomes a distant memory. Neither hutcheson nor donaldb nor anyone else will remind you of that early thought that any category needs editors to be brought in, and you will start telling people that 3 years for someone to have their site reviewed isn't too long because that bears no relationship to the DMOZ concept. It is what happens - you start with one idea, and once an editor realise that you've actually missed what DMOZ is actually about in reality, why the culture of not directing anyone to do anything, actually works extremely well.

Many categories have multiple editors - a small one with an existing active editor might not need another (squabbling over the one submission received a month is likely to be frustrating for both).

Seems to me that you write very well, are capable of understanding concepts quickly, and are more than familiar with the volunteer concept. If you have been totally honest about all affiliations when applying to become an editor then maybe the main problem has been with category choice, so have another go, in a small non-commercial backwater category or your home town in Regional (sub-category if it is a big Regional category) perhaps, just to learn how things work. Not being a meta I can't say if there were other reasons for rejections but unless a meta comes along and tells you never to darken our door again etc. I can't see you would lose by giving it one more go.

>However, the two-three categories I did submit too are pretty popular and I was told they are backlogged, so which would mean that there is an interest in those categories.

Ah ... but popular with WHOM? an interest by WHOM?

You can't mean "surfers" -- you don't have any information on how many surfers browse that category. You must mean "webmasters".

WEBMASTERS want to appear there, and lots of them already have. That is, the category already takes care of the vast majority of surfers' needs. And it will be very difficult to come with anything new on the subject -- to provide anything that isn't already offered. It'll also be very difficult for the editor to recognize whether the site offers anything new.

So: a COMPETITIVE category. A Great Dismal Swamp of toxic waste submittals. A spam magnet. A painful, difficult, unproductive, and unrewarding place to work. The sort of place a submittal could languish for three years and NEVER BE MISSED: as everyone knows, surfer and webmaster alike.

And (it's an evil world) the kind of place where webmasters desperate to not be never missed, apply everything -- up to and including stalking and legal threats -- to coerce editors. A front-line trench on the Eastern front in the dead of winter: absolutely not a place to put new recruits!

See how different supply-side analysis is from demand-side analysis?

So: how to start out as an editor?

Pick a category that's NOT popular, that feels downright neglected by the webmasters, where hardly anyone creates sites, and those that create them don't spend their time in sleazoid internet marketing forums or spamming the ODP. "West Podunk, New Jersey/Society and Culture" is a good bet. All those affiliate/adsense doorway spammers all over the globe aren't creating sites for the WP Garden Club! And yet, communities and gardening are both far more significant parts of human experience and knowledge and culture than ... picking a brand of patent nostrums, um, dietary supplements. And the indubitably brilliant and comprehensive websites of the Anchorage Tundra Mosses Association and Tampa Banana Growers Club simply cannot satisfy that East Orange gardener looking for information on perennials that thrive on sanitary landfills.

But that's just an example. We can't "choose" where to put you, because what the ODP needs from you is the stuff in the odd corners of your mind -- the things that get left off your professional resume because they are merely part of your human existance, the things even your closest friends might not know that you know. You can choose to explore what to do with your life, or review what you've done: your education (especially the parts you haven't aired and dusted in a long time) or the things you wish you had learned instead; your beliefs, hobbies, social circles; the places you know well, or would like to know better.

Commerce has its own mechanisms for self-promotion, and all of it that is ever necessary will get along fine without the ODP. So order the rest of life first, and commerce will fit in as it really ought.

And ... save your suggested URLs and descriptions in a text file. You'll have something to look at if you get specific feedback, and you'll have something to start from if you try again.

donaldb, oneeye and hutcheson,

Thank you all for your responses. As much as I want my websites listed in the directory it is obvious there is not much more I can do than wait and be patient.

As for my applying to be an editor, I may try again in the future when some of my time frees up.

Thank you again for your replies!

longcall911 said:

I know that editors surely do not need outside opinion on internal matters, but since that opinion has been welcomed in the past, and since this is a very important issue, I'll offer mine.

Discontinuing the status check is in my view long overdue. I suspect that it started as a courtesy to submitters, but from what I can see it had become overrun and out of control.

Hopefully those editors who fought the first line of defense in that forum can put their time to better use.

Of course, the anti-ODP group will use the discontinuation as *proof* of whatever their most recent allegation might be. But hopefully, most will see through their argument.

Good decision...

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I still think ending the relationship with Google, by denying them the ability to index the ODP is the best option.

Take away the problem, and all of the other little issues will just disappaear....

hutcheson said:

>However, the two-three categories I did submit too are pretty popular and I was told they are backlogged, so which would mean that there is an interest in those categories.

Ah ... but popular with WHOM? an interest by WHOM?

You can't mean "surfers" -- you don't have any information on how many surfers browse that category. You must mean "webmasters".

WEBMASTERS want to appear there, and lots of them already have. That is, the category already takes care of the vast majority of surfers' needs. And it will be very difficult to come with anything new on the subject -- to provide anything that isn't already offered. It'll also be very difficult for the editor to recognize whether the site offers anything new.

So: a COMPETITIVE category. A Great Dismal Swamp of toxic waste submittals. A spam magnet. A painful, difficult, unproductive, and unrewarding place to work. The sort of place a submittal could languish for three years and NEVER BE MISSED: as everyone knows, surfer and webmaster alike.

And (it's an evil world) the kind of place where webmasters desperate to not be never missed, apply everything -- up to and including stalking and legal threats -- to coerce editors. A front-line trench on the Eastern front in the dead of winter: absolutely not a place to put new recruits!

See how different supply-side analysis is from demand-side analysis?

So: how to start out as an editor?

Pick a category that's NOT popular, that feels downright neglected by the webmasters, where hardly anyone creates sites, and those that create them don't spend their time in sleazoid internet marketing forums or spamming the ODP. "West Podunk, New Jersey/Society and Culture" is a good bet. All those affiliate/adsense doorway spammers all over the globe aren't creating sites for the WP Garden Club! And yet, communities and gardening are both far more significant parts of human experience and knowledge and culture than ... picking a brand of patent nostrums, um, dietary supplements. And the indubitably brilliant and comprehensive websites of the Anchorage Tundra Mosses Association and Tampa Banana Growers Club simply cannot satisfy that East Orange gardener looking for information on perennials that thrive on sanitary landfills.

But that's just an example. We can't "choose" where to put you, because what the ODP needs from you is the stuff in the odd corners of your mind -- the things that get left off your professional resume because they are merely part of your human existance, the things even your closest friends might not know that you know. You can choose to explore what to do with your life, or review what you've done: your education (especially the parts you haven't aired and dusted in a long time) or the things you wish you had learned instead; your beliefs, hobbies, social circles; the places you know well, or would like to know better.

Commerce has its own mechanisms for self-promotion, and all of it that is ever necessary will get along fine without the ODP. So order the rest of life first, and commerce will fit in as it really ought.

And ... save your suggested URLs and descriptions in a text file. You'll have something to look at if you get specific feedback, and you'll have something to start from if you try again.

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WOW!!! Beautiful rant!

Dump GOOGLE!!!!!