Indicate Which Categories Desparately Need Editors

I have been trying to get a site listed for over two years, and I was informed by a moderator that waiting over two years is not unusual. I have also read in these forums that one editor has a backlog of around 1500 sites. It would be helpful if you indicated what categories were in desparate need of editors so that I could inderstand why my site is not listed yet after 2 years.
Instead of a message in the categories that says

"Volunteer to edit this category", why not include the backlog for that category. That would make a 2 year delay more understandable and might bring forth more editors.

Regards
Bearmugs

As we aren't a listing service we don't have a backlog. We just have suggestions waiting to be reviewed. When this review will happen we don't know. And remember suggested sites is only one way for us to find sites worth listing.

There are no categories in desparate need of editors. But we can always use good editors in all categories (but we have limitations were and how a new editor can apply).

It would be helpful if you indicated what categories were in desparate need of editors so that I could inderstand why my site is not listed yet after 2 years.

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That is easy. No category is in desperate need of editors. Most highly active editors can edit in almost every category - if there is a need they respond. Backlogs are not a problem for editors, the pools of suggestions merely supplement more valuable sources of sites such as mining link pages on already listed sites, search engines, and a multitude of other sources. For any one topic the pool of suggestions probably accounts for 1% or less of the available sites from which to choose listings. In fact we don't have backlogs at all because we are not editors to process the pools of suggestions, we aren't a webmaster listing service. Hope that helps in your understanding of what we are about. Thanks for the suggestion anyway.

[beaten again to the post - must think about this long-winded thing again ]

[beaten again to the post - must think about this long-winded thing again ]

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Ofcourse not. How else could you win this trophy for 2005. :angel:

"No category is in desperate need of editors."

This sounds strange, but it is worth emphasizing. Not just because there are those two or three hundred editors who can edit any of the 600,000 categories, but for a more profound reason.

A category needs work if (and only if) some volunteer editor decides it needs work. The number of submittals to it has no logical connection to anything whatsoever. If a good site is not listed, then what difference does it make whether it's been submitted or not? In either case the real shortcoming of the ODP is the same; and the real value of a volunteer to review the site is the same.

And if the site is a chaotic mass of steaming plagiarism, what difference if all 1500 of its plages have been submitted? The category is still just as complete without it; the value of an editor's work is still exactly the same.

So Submittals cannot be any gage of anything. We used to give out (approximations of) the number of submittals. We found that people invariably malfounded all kinds of illogical conclusions, and contrived bizarre justification for all kinds of antisocial behavior, on that meaningless datum. We never found that people profited to any good purpose. In other words, whatever we said was turned into SOME kind of bizarre lie. We couldn't tell the truth without having the effect of misinforming people. So we agreed it was better for all concerned for us not to give out that information.

So, how do you REALLY tell whether a category "NEEDS" work?

It's simple. If a category is deficient enough that some public-spirited volunteer is willing to lay aside all else to improve the category, then it needs work.

If, in a world of limited resources, in some relevant person's judgment some of those resources can most profitably be assigned to improving that category, then it needs work. Otherwise, it really doesn't need work.

Who's a "relevant person"? A public-spirited surfer who's willing to volunteer to expend those resources out of his own personal energy. (That's it -- nobody else gets a vote. One volunteer doesn't even get a vote on the next volunteer's priorities.)

What about webmasters? What about what they call their "needs", or what anyone else would call their "wishes"?

The ODP doesn't harm them -- except in cases where simply revealing an entity's reputation is disastrous to their plans. The ODP in no way interferes with their websites, with their activities or businesses or promotions. Anyone may tolerate the ODP's existance without blighting their own work (except, of course, insofar as they try to profit from information similar to what the ODP gives away freely.)

And there are numerous thousands of people all over the world, offering webmasters services of every kind. After everything the ODP does, webmasters are still just as free to take advantage of people who are willing to provide the services they want -- even freer, as the ODP may even help them find such people.

But there is no need, no purpose, and no utility for webmasters to attempt to coerce the volunteers who are providing some different service to someone else under the aegis of the ODP.

And, whatever site submittals ARE, they are NOT, nor are they intended to be, an instrument of volunteer coercion. They are merely information, which the volunteers may use, if they wish, according to their best judgment of its value and reliability.

My apologies ladies and gentlemen. Let me rephrase.
As Cateditall said

gimmster said:

Mostly because it simply isn't true.
I have a site waiting for listing since Feb 2002, and I've been an editor all that time. Yes, I could list it myself, but there are around 1500 other sites waiting in that area that I'd process first (and I have done some of them).
:tree:

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So therefore, if one editor has a backlog of 1500 submissions, there are obviously some categories more in need of editors than others.
How about putting the "OPEN" back into the Open Directory Project.

Again, you're misunderstanding how the directory works. You're putting greater emphasis on the so-called "backlog" than we would. The pool of suggested sites is only one area where editors may go to find listable sites. A backlog implies that it is our primary task is to review the sites that have been suggested and that's just not the case.

Reread hutcheson's response -- he answered your question already.

What you are also missing is the essence of the statement: that the editor would feel honor bound to look at all pending suggestions (inlcuding those the stink up the place) before taking any action on their own site.

Oh, I forgot, all ODP editors are supposed to be corrupt!

No, no, a thousand five hundred times NO!

It is not submittals that make categories need work. One submittal, or a thousand submittals more or less, don't indicate how much a category needs work.

A category needs work if (and only if) a volunteer feels a need to work on it. So ... if a category doesn't have anyone that thinks it is worth improving ... then it doesn't need improvement.

A category could PROFIT by work, only if there are actual SITES ON THE WEB that could improve its usefulness to surfers.

Sites on the web. Not submittals. They are not the same thing, as editors know well from experience! Many categories have hundreds and thousands of submittals, and yet the editors know full well that the categories are comprehensive. Other categories have no submittals, and the editors know well there are good sites to be had for the looking.

Submittals don't matter. How many, how old, how grandiose, how importunate -- none of those things have anything to do with actual category needs.

Also if you read the Editor application guidelines it says that large catagories are not appropriate for new editors.

So even if all these metas and editalls and everyone else was somehow wrong about long 'queues' not being undesirable it wouldn't matter. applications to excessively large castagories are likely to be declined; a new editor would have to apply to a smaller sub-catagory, and work his way up to get permissions in the larger catagory..


...but wait, that is exactly what happens anyway. New editors go to small catagories and learn, then help wherever they can as their permissions increase and time allows. So *even* if you were right (your not) nothing would actually change, so theres no need to change the system.