http://www.french-giftshop.com

Hello,
I am writing to find out about the status of our website, http://www.french-giftshop.com submitted to the category,
http://dmoz.org/Regional/Europe/France/Business_and_Economy/Shopping on the 28th of October, for the fourth time of this year. Is it possible that our site still waits to be reviewed or is it rejected by whatever reason?
Thank you in advance for your attention and consideration.
I heard someone in France having submitted his own site every week and got accepted at the end of 8th trial. Is it possible?
Sincerely,
Yoomi

We have a submission from you on the 21st of June sitting in that category with less than three dozen other sites. There is no record of your site being previously rejected or accepted.

Thank you for the precious information. I am embrassed to ask what it means us to do. Can we assume that our site has not yet been reviewed and still there's hope that it can be reviewed and indexed with ODP? What happened to our recent submission? Does it adversely affect our waiting status by pushing our previous submission further behind other newly submitted sites? Would it help if we resubmit or submit to other category?

>> Can we assume that our site has not yet been reviewed and still there's hope that it can be reviewed and indexed with ODP? <<

Yep, you can assume that as it's the truth <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" alt="" /> . Once an editor reviews your site they can do one of three things:

• Accept your site to that category
• Move your site to a more appropriate category or
• Reject your site as not being suitable for listing [/list:u]
  
  But, at the moment, your site is still awaiting an editor to cast their eye over it...
  
  &gt;&gt; What happened to our recent submission? &lt;&lt;
  
  Pass. The last record of you submitting to that category was the 21st of June. If you submitted again and received the 'Unable to determine your IP' message, then your site may still be sitting in our 'Double-check/misplaced' queue and when an editor checks that queue (which is done on a 'several times a day basis') and moves your site to this unreviewed queue, then it will overwrite your previous submission. Of course, there is a slight chance that we may not have received your previous submission (around a month or so ago, the ODP was suffering from a couple of technical problems: the majority of which have now been sorted).
  
  &gt;&gt; Does it adversely affect our waiting status by pushing our previous submission further behind other newly submitted sites? &lt;&lt;
  
  Ok, a bit of techy details follow (and, considering I'm slightly drunk at the point of typing means they may not make 100% sense <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" alt="" /> ): Each category has its own "Unreviewed site queue". This is, by default, sorted in "oldest first" order (editors can change the sort order if they want). Newer submissions of the same URL usually overwrite the previous submission. Therefore, if you resubmit your site whilst it is still awaiting review AND an editor has 'Sort by submission' date enabled - then you will "push" your site to the "back of the queue".
  
  However, some editors prefer to sort by URL (myself included as it makes it easier to sport spam), or by submitted title - AND there is nothing stopping an editor looking at the unreviewed queue and just reviewing numbers 6, 13 and 23. All in all, the "idea" of an "unreviewed queue" of 30 sites can usually be likened to a hat full of "30 submission slips" - any of which can be picked out and sorted in any order.
  
  &gt;&gt; Would it help if we resubmit or submit to other category? &lt;&lt;
  
  Probably not. An editor, seeing that your site is more appropriate to the category you have already submitted to, should move your submission to that category so a "local editor" can review it. (side: a "local editor" is an editor that decides to review that categories unreviewed queue - they could be the 'listed editor', an editor of a 'parent category', an editall or a meta editor). Therefore, apart from wasting an editors time, it wouldn't help at all.
  
  However, an editor could delete your site (especially if they are aware that you are 'queued for review' in another category) with the editors-only note "Not suitable for this category - already awaiting review in X/Y/Z category" (or similar). If a site attracts a lot of editor notes like this, then investigations will commence whether you are attempting to spam the directory: this is something we, for obvious reasons, are not in favour of.
  
  To restate our add URL notes: "Submit to the most appropriate category to your site". Submitting to other categories ("just because they have an editor" etc), will NOT help your site being listed and could even "hurt" your sites reputation in the ODP.
  
  Of course, most sites are "entitled" to a listing under the appropriate "topical" category (Arts, Entertainment, Society etc) AND the appropriate "regional" category (Regional/Europe/United_Kingdom/England/Leicestershire for example) - any other submissions should involve more than 10 minutes thought ("is my site really suitable for listing in this category? Does it provide sufficent information/content for listing here?").
  
  I hope that answers all your questions (if it doesn't, post again and either someone else or myself, when I'm sober <img src="/images/icons/grin.gif" alt="" /> , will attempt to answer your queries).