How long to be patient??

How will what you are proposing help the editor?

If the answer is "I don't know, I can't imagine how telling them twice is more helpful than telling them once..." -- then just say "no." Think about being helpful, do only what would be helpful, and you won't have to worry about being a spammer.

(Don't hide behind that "CONSIDERED" verb; it won't cover you. If your target "considers" you a spammer, then you are. It's like being "considered" a bore.)

Manco said:

Is it considered Spamming Dmoz if I submit my site more than once per year? I don't want to jeopardize my site for another decade by doing so.

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Why?.
After you made the first suggestion it can be in 3 different situations:
1) it is still waiting review - no need to suggest it again
2) it is listed - no need to suggest it again,
3) it is rejected - no need to suggest it again

I am not an editor but reading stuff from here and around the web related with dmoz, i think, and I underline - this is just my opinion, that if you want to have your site listed, the most important think is to:

- have a good site
- have links on other portals, directorys or whatever - to maximize the chance an Dmoz editor will come across it.

In my opinion if you submit a site using the dmoz submit form, you can tell your childeren to wach out as in a few years (+20 that is ) you will get listed ... or not


So the bottom line is: if you have a good , professional spam free site with info on it even if it's comercial you need to have your url posted around the web a lot to maximize the chances an editor will come across it , visit it and place it within Dmoz.


For example: I have an old site that I am still using more or less - non comercial with no more then 5 pages. It is listed in Dmoz. I've never submit the URL to Dmoz. It just got listed. But I do have submit the site to regional directorys and I have about 50 links to this site.

There's no question that prominent sites will attract the attention of editors, and you are right, they have to be "good" ones too, in terms of content.

I have listed sites by picking up business cards in places I do business, or got URLs out of my local paper. I love supporting small, local businesses, and having them listed as a resource in the neighborhood they support can only do them good, I believe.

Submitting to the ODP does you no harm, and doesn't take up much time at all. You can do that in ADDITION to the advice you gave. It might increase your chances of attracting the attention of an editor.

It's the people that submit and then repeatedly do the "Are we there yet?" thing that is, frankly, not useful time management. No-one can tell you whether a site will get reviewed. That is not the nature of the beast, and it never has been.

I think as long as you treat the ODP with realistic expectations it can do you now harm.

why does it take so long to get listed?

not enough editors? True to some extent

But also... i confess.. i have a number of sites that i'm with-holding a listing from because they just don't cut it yet... but i haven't deleted them... i keep them in unreviewed.. why? beacause im a power mad meglomaniac of course!!!

Or maybe its because i'm really passionate about DMOZ and moreover im VERY passionate about the categories i edit in and I want good quality websites with unique content in them... i have two sites in one unreviewed list that have been there for almost a year.. they just don't cut it yet, but i really want them to, one of them is completely void of all content bar a text CV, yet i can see from that CV that when/if the rest of the site is complete there is a real good chance i can press the "update" button.

there are many reasons why a site is kept waiting. and its frustrating when you wait, I've waited for my own sites to be entered and i've been rejected!!

and the one that was rejected still comes 4th in google 1st in msn and 1st in yahoo

it's a complete nonsense that a website needs DMOZ, but DMOZ does need websites and thats why I do it!

Wow i had no idea how long the waiting times can be. Too bad its not somehow more automated or to even pay people to review sites full time rather than volunteers. I'd gladly pay to have my site listed if it meant a somewhat quick turnaround time.

musclemorph said:

Wow i had no idea how long the waiting times can be. Too bad its not somehow more automated or to even pay people to review sites full time rather than volunteers. I'd gladly pay to have my site listed if it meant a somewhat quick turnaround time.

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but then if you paid us we'd *have* to list you regardless of whether your site was worth listing or not.

besides there are plenty of paid directories out there if you want to pay find them.

musclemorph - your site requires membership, an editor will not be able to review it.

Dmoz it's a great idea as concept, however I do find a lot of trash within... i don't know how it got there .. maybe they just swich websites once in or something .. is there a group that is reviewing the sites already in ? it should be...

Once again - domoz it's great as concept and idea but for some reson is over-rated. - maybe just because it's kind of hard to get listed, people say
- "It must be good it's so hard to get in"
I know it helps the site once listed from the SEO point of view .. with the PR and all but still.... I do belive that this is not the most important issue.
And as I said before, the most important one is: - HAVE A GOOD RICH CONTENT WEBSITE.
If you follow the above rule you will get listed in dmoz anyway .. so start there.

You may reply: how is this wise dmoz old guy anyway ?
I would answer: nobody - is just an opinion.

otr said:

Dmoz it's a great idea as concept, however I do find a lot of trash within... i don't know how it got there .. maybe they just swich websites once in or something .. is there a group that is reviewing the sites already in ? it should be...

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otr, yes, there is a group that reviews sites already in - all the editors belong to that group

Seriously, it's one of the jobs of editing to make sure that existing listings still contain applicable content.

It's a tough job, though - we try to automate it, but there are always ways around it - the bottom line is that humans do it better.

But we are not omnipresent - if you see sites listed that are junk, I would ask you (or anyone reading this) to please be part of the solution and help out - we have a thread for it here at the Resource Zone in the "Quality Control Feedback" area called " Report Hijacks, Dead Links & Inappropriate ODP Content Here ONLY"

Things reported in here get fairly quick attention.


...and as for the ODP being "over-rated" I don't see many "ratings" for it - all I see are people complaining that it is over-rated. I think that most people who know what the ODP is about recognise that while it has a lot of good points, it most certainly isn't perfect.

pvgool]It all depends on the editor. Some do it completely at random. Some have another way they prefer to select a site from the suggestion pool. [B]I myself look at the provided titles and descriptions. If these look compliant to DMOZ guidelines the suggestion has much higher chances to be reviewed[/B said:

as one with a description full of marketinghype.

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Hmmm .... teachers, military instructors and other educators sometimes have ways of "hinting" what might be important, on a future test, or the likes.

One college prof I had would use a variety of body language "tics" to "hint" something he said was something you might see or hear again ... I think pvgool just did a little foot stomp - did you hear it?

This should not be a real surprise to anyone, but I thought I would point it out anyone; thanks pvgool.

There's going to be a test?

Yes, and Hutcheson is the proctor!

There is one situation in which resubmission might be useful. Perhaps a website was terrible, and is now fantastic. Whilst it was terrible it was submitted, and was probably deleted. But the new-completely-redone-and-expanded website is worth submitting in its own right.

But this applies in any particular case with vanishingly small probability. Adding more garish colours and a picture of the dog will merely convert terrible to slightly-larger-and-slightly-louder-but-more-terrible. Which is nowhere near good enough.

spectregunner said:

Yes, and Hutcheson is the proctor!

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That sounds vaguely obscene.

Alucard said:

That sounds vaguely obscene.

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Yes, and they're not the most fun doctors you'll ever visit either

Alucard said:

...and as for the ODP being "over-rated" I don't see many "ratings" for it - all I see are people complaining that it is over-rated. I think that most people who know what the ODP is about recognise that while it has a lot of good points, it most certainly isn't perfect.

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It has a lot of good points indeed.
It's overrated from the "beeing there" point of view.