Have I been blackballed?

My company sells a wide variety of items across many different stores. I have original content and offer unique products, yet I am unable over the years to get a single site listed on DMOZ.

I have re-applied, about once a year or so and stay within the TOS. I see competitors have been accepted in some cases, often with lesser quality goods, selection, or search engine ranking. I know how that may sound on the face of it, but it is a true statement.

I have read some of the posts, and there is some stiff-arming going on on the part of DMOZ, and I would like to get beyond that and get some use-able assistance. If I have done something to offend, please advise. I would like to make ammends if so.

I would like to know if I or my company has been blackballed, what information I would need to provide for finding out, why it was done (if at all), and how to address that decision.

For someone to be blackballed (as you call it) he must have done some very serious offences.
I know of only two options to be banned from DMOZ.
1. offer a bribe / payment to get a website listed
2. excessive amount of suggestions (and that means real high amounts of suggestions to many different categoires)

Just some tips (they are for you but also for all other people in the same situation)

You write about "my company" and "get a single site listed".
DMOZ has the policy to list only the main domain for a company. For us the other domains are only subsites of the main domain.
There are exceptions. In some cases we list more than 1 domain and there are instances that we even list several deeplinks from a single domain. But those are exceptions, and only editors can decided to list these. We prefer not to receive suggestions for second domains and deeplinks.


"I have re-applied, about once a year or so and stay within the TOS"
Which strange as we ask to suggest a website only ONCE to the one best category. Suggesting a wesbite every year won't get you banned but it might at the same time not be helpfull to you.


"with lesser quality goods, selection, or search engine ranking"
These are not things we look at when reviewing a website.


Each suggested website will at one time be reviewed. Due to the way DMOZ works we can not predict when this will happen. It could be tomorrow, next week, next month or even after several years. We also do not process suggestions in a specific order. So websites suggested after yours might be reviewed first. Nothing to worry about and nothing that you or I can change.

Just to reinforce one of pvgool's points. We rarely ban websites and, when we do, it's for very good reasons. If an otherwise listable website has been banned, we don't discuss the matter with the owner (because there's no need) and there's no means of addressing the matter (because there's no point).

Thanks for the reply. I do sense a defensive tone, please be assured that it is un-necessary as there is no blame being applied.

Let me re-state to be sure I understand. A company owns a domain as a store and one as a company info page, one offering a product and one offering nothing but information. Although the company site offers no real services or utility to the viewer, it is the only site of the two that is eligible for DMOZ listing.

For example, ABCcompany.com owns Blenders.Com. Although the store is completely relevant to blenders and anyone looking for blenders, it is ineligible because it is owned by ABCcompany.


I have to question this policy as it would be safe to say that almost all of the stores on DMOZ are owned, published and operated by companies and individuals that have more than a single store.

It is not possible to apply this as a critereon for denial across the board.

borkboing said:

Let me re-state to be sure I understand. A company owns a domain as a store and one as a company info page, one offering a product and one offering nothing but information. Although the company site offers no real services or utility to the viewer, it is the only site of the two that is eligible for DMOZ listing.

Click to expand...

Yes, normaly we would list the company website and not the different shop websites that this company owns. For us it is just one website spread accross several domains
It is not our fault if the company does not link their own domains together.

I have to question this policy as it would be safe to say that almost all of the stores on DMOZ are owned, published and operated by companies and individuals that have more than a single store.

Click to expand...

And we try to list only one per company.

But there are exceptions. Sometimes we decide to list more than one website onwed by the same person/company.

Let me give you an example.
Company-A has 3 websites. On the first website they sell all kinds of fruit. http://www.dmoz.org/Shopping/Food/Produce/Fruit/ would be the best category.
On their second website they sell Mushrooms, also a category is very easy to find http://www.dmoz.org/Shopping/Food/Produce/Mushrooms/
Their 3th website is the company website, it has only 1 page with who they are, their address and links to their 2 shops. We will list this website and not the other 2 in http://www.dmoz.org/Shopping/Food/Produce as this category is the first that matches both products.

Also an example when we might decide to list 2 sites from the same person.
John is a dentist and has a website for his dentistry in Manhattan,it will be listed in http://www.dmoz.org/Regional/North_America/United_States/New_York/Localities/N/New_York_City/Manhattan/Health/Dentistry/
John is also totaly crazy about his sea water aquarium and has build a website to show what he has created. As this a totaly different kind of subject we will list a second website for him in http://www.dmoz.org/Recreation/Pets/Fish_and_Aquaria/Marine/Personal_Pages/

As each situation is unique we can not give a single critereon that will fit all situations. Just a rule of thumb.

Let me give you an example.
Company-A has 3 websites. On the first website they sell all kinds of fruit. http://www.dmoz.org/Shopping/Food/Produce/Fruit/ would be the best category.
On their second website they sell Mushrooms, also a category is very easy to find http://www.dmoz.org/Shopping/Food/Produce/Mushrooms/
Their 3th website is the company website, it has only 1 page with who they are, their address and links to their 2 shops. We will list this website and not the other 2 in http://www.dmoz.org/Shopping/Food/Produce as this category is the first that matches both products.

My stores are like your example. They look nothing alike and sell vastly different products such as countertop dishwashers, santa suits, hawaiian shirts and compact kitchens. They have different looks, themes and designs. You have to look at the fine print to find my company name.

It makes sense that DMOZ would avoid having every subdomain or page listed like some would prefer, especially if they were similar, but that is not what is going on. That is why I was wondering about being blackballed.

Is there any way to find out?

As jimnoble has already written we don't discuss such issues.
I mentioned that it is very unlikely that you or your websites have been banned as banning is a last resort for very, very bad behaviour.
Did you behave very, very bad? (see the examples I gave). No? Than your sites are not banned. Yes? Than we don't want to discuss the reasons. You know how you behaved so you know if there was ever a reason for a ban.
For normal people, and as far as I have seen you are such a person, there is no reason to fear a ban.
You just have to show patience as it can realy take a long time before a website gets reviewed.

Each website designer has complete control over how his own website is structured. Website reviewers don't get a vote, so there's no need for discussion.

But website reviewers have complete control over how websites are reviewed. Website designers don't get a vote, so there's no need for discussion.

A website can be all accessable from one domain name, or it can be spread out over dozens or hundreds of domain names. (Obviously, surfers--and anyone concerned with accurately tracking company reputation--will prefer the latter: so it's obvious that whatever website review rules there are, will be designed to ensure that companies that use one central domain name aren't put to a disadvantage by companies that are trying to game the systems--whether search engines or directories.)

A website can be all linked together so that any surfer can find whatever is there from any page, or it can be so fragmented. (Obviously again, surfers will prefer the latter, so again, website review rules have to be designed to make sure that more useful website designs aren't at a disadvantage when compared to surfer-hostile, search-engine gaming designs.

The process has to be flexible, to respond to new abuses, because there are always people trying to find new ways of gaming the system.

So that's the world we live in. We all have to decide how to work within it--whether designing, or reviewing. But you're not going to find anyone who's willing even to listen to your explanation of why your site should have more Shopping directory entries than Walmart.com.