My software site has not been listed

Ammalgam · Oct 29, 2009

I have a software fan site that I submitted to DMOZ and I have heard nothing back for 10 months.

Every 3 months I have tried to resubmit this site and have heard absolutely nothing back.

The site has quality backlinks, a good page rank and traffic in the tens of thousands daily.

In addition, it provides timely and quality software information.

I have been reading the guidelines and have tried to be patient but..10 months?

Someone please help!

Onuora

hutcheson · Oct 29, 2009

I'm constantly amazed how many people assume that things like "quality of backlinks", page rank, or site traffice matter ... at all.

How is the reviewer going to know any of those things, even if he WANTED to? Why would he want to? Is a site less unique, or less valuable to a visitor, just because it has fewer visitors or links?

I don't understand. Maybe you can explain. How did YOU think we would know what quality your backlinks were? Or what your traffic was? And why did YOU think we would care?

If we can figure out where people who say things like this are coming from, maybe we can do a better job of explaining WHY those things don't matter, and can't ever matter. And that has the potential of reducing frustration for many website owners.

Ammalgam · Oct 30, 2009

My response

I was trying to be as vague as I believe the guidelines for this forum mandate that I be. If I told you what the niche was or the site subject, the context of my statements re: popularity etc would make more sense.

The reviewer can extrapolate a few things about a site by doing basic research (if they wanted or cared to). How many feedburner readers, how many aweber subcribers, how many responses to posts, alexa rank, age of domain etc.. I could go on.

A website owner who has put time and sweat into a quality website and has seen the corresponding payback in terms of user traffic would naturally think that his/her his site would be worthy of a listing or (at least) some feedback.

I don't see why that would surprise you.

Since DMOZ evaluations are highly subjective, I would have thought that a site that is successful in a particular niche and has no overtly disqualifying characteristics would be a slam dunk.

Also, 9 + months without any type of response is a little harsh dont you think?

crazy me...

hutcheson said:
I'm constantly amazed how many people assume that things like "quality of backlinks", page rank, or site traffice matter ... at all.

How is the reviewer going to know any of those things, even if he WANTED to? Why would he want to? Is a site less unique, or less valuable to a visitor, just because it has fewer visitors or links?

I don't understand. Maybe you can explain. How did YOU think we would know what quality your backlinks were? Or what your traffic was? And why did YOU think we would care?

If we can figure out where people who say things like this are coming from, maybe we can do a better job of explaining WHY those things don't matter, and can't ever matter. And that has the potential of reducing frustration for many website owners.

pvgool · Oct 30, 2009

> If I told you what the niche was or the site subject, the context of my
> statements re: popularity etc would make more sense.
No, they still won't make any sense.

> The reviewer can extrapolate a few things about a site by doing basic
> research (if they wanted or cared to). How many feedburner readers, how
> many aweber subcribers, how many responses to posts, alexa rank, age of
> domain etc.. I could go on.
All totaly of no influence on the review process. Content is all we care about.

> A website owner who has put time and sweat into a quality website and has
> seen the corresponding payback in terms of user traffic would naturally
> think that his/her his site would be worthy of a listing or (at least) some
> feedback.
Every website owner thinks their website is worthy of a listing. Reality is that most websites are not.
And as has been specified in the FAQ and in many other threads with similar questions we (almost) never send any feedback to people who suggest websites.

> I don't see why that would surprise you.
Because we explained it many times before. It just seems that people do not care to read things like guidelines, FAQ and older threads. Just a little search would have answered your question and you would not have needed to start a new thread. That is waht still surprises me.

> Since DMOZ evaluations are highly subjective,
No, they are objective. There are clear guidelines all editors need to follow. And these guidelines are available for everybody to read.

> I would have thought that a site that is successful in a particular niche and
> has no overtly disqualifying characteristics would be a slam dunk.
That is something we only know after a site is reviewed.

> Also, 9 + months without any type of response is a little harsh dont you
> think?
Times can vary from afew days to a few years. 9 months is no exception.

> crazy me...
That is not for us to judge on.

Ammalgam · Oct 30, 2009

Thanks for the feedback

pvgool said:
> If I told you what the niche was or the site subject, the context of my
> statements re: popularity etc would make more sense.
No, they still won't make any sense.

xxx impossible for you to say so definitively since you havent seen my site.

> The reviewer can extrapolate a few things about a site by doing basic
> research (if they wanted or cared to). How many feedburner readers, how
> many aweber subcribers, how many responses to posts, alexa rank, age of
> domain etc.. I could go on.
All totaly of no influence on the review process. Content is all we care about.

xxx Good point although you could argue that high traffic, multiple subscribers, post responses, feedburner readers etc SOMETIMES corresponds to quality content. People tend (IMHO) to gravitate to quallity. I may not agree with Rush Limbaugh but he has a ton of listeners. He's high quality in his niche, I cant deny that.

> A website owner who has put time and sweat into a quality website and has
> seen the corresponding payback in terms of user traffic would naturally
> think that his/her his site would be worthy of a listing or (at least) some
> feedback.
Every website owner thinks their website is worthy of a listing. Reality is that most websites are not.
And as has been specified in the FAQ and in many other threads with similar questions we (almost) never send any feedback to people who suggest websites.

XXX Noted.

> I don't see why that would surprise you.
Because we explained it many times before. It just seems that people do not care to read things like guidelines, FAQ and older threads. Just a little search would have answered your question and you would not have needed to start a new thread. That is waht still surprises me.

XXX Noted.

> Since DMOZ evaluations are highly subjective,
No, they are objective. There are clear guidelines all editors need to follow. And these guidelines are available for everybody to read.

XXX We have to agree to disagree. No matter how many rules or guidelines you have, it comes down to people. People are fallible and make mistakes, have biases etc

> I would have thought that a site that is successful in a particular niche and
> has no overtly disqualifying characteristics would be a slam dunk.
That is something we only know after a site is reviewed.

XXX Yes, whenever you get to it.

> Also, 9 + months without any type of response is a little harsh dont you
> think?
Times can vary from afew days to a few years. 9 months is no exception.

XXX And herein lies the rub. If there is a process that had an arbitary waiting period and people wanted to use the service, it should be no surprise that people are on here complaining and wailing all the time. People are not used to that form of service in any other part of our lives so why should we be happy about it here? Just because we have no choice doesn't mean we should smile and take it. In fact if you look at your post and the clinical tone you take when you say "Times can vary from afew days to a few years. 9 months is no exception.", it seems almost dismissive of all frustration people who want to be listed are feeling.

Just my take...

jimnoble · Oct 30, 2009

If there is a process that had an arbitary waiting period and people wanted to use the service, it should be no surprise that people are on here complaining and wailing all the time. People are not used to that form of service in any other part of our lives so why should we be happy about it here?

This is the key. You've highlighted your misconceptions in two sentences.

Let me summarise our position as clearly as I possibly can.

We don't offer a service to website owners.
We offer a service to surfers and our downstream database users.

Now we've explained all this many times in this forum, in its FAQ and elsewhere. It's what we are and what we do. If you want a directory that provides prompt listing services to website owners, we aren't it. There are plenty out there that do however

.

Ammalgam · Oct 30, 2009

Thanks for the clarification BUT

You offer webmasters the opportunity to submit suggested links to URL's.

You can throw as many disclaimers out there as possible but if you ask people to suggest something, it's human nature for people to be curious to see if you adopted their suggestions or not in a timely manner.

You guys act like you are Google. You are not. Google crawl the web looking for quality sites. If our whining and complaints are tiresome, I would respectfully suggest that your directory stop asking for suggestions and start crawling the web yourselves.

OR

Simplify your terms of service and state "Please send us your suggestions but note that we will never get back to you, will review your suggestion over a period of years and may never list your suggestion". If that phrase sounds a little crazy, you might want to think about it because that is basically what you are saying on here.

Respectfully

jimnoble said:
This is the key. You've highlighted your misconceptions in two sentences.

Let me summarise our position as clearly as I possibly can.

We don't offer a service to website owners.
We offer a service to surfers and our downstream database users.

Now we've explained all this many times in this forum, in its FAQ and elsewhere. It's what we are and what we do. If you want a directory that provides prompt listing services to website owners, we aren't it. There are plenty out there that do however .

jimnoble · Oct 30, 2009

You guys act like you are Google. You are not. Google crawl the web looking for quality sites.

Yet another misconception. Google crawls the web and will index pretty much whatever it finds. Any evaluation that it does is algorithmic with no regard to 'usefulness'.

I would respectfully suggest that your directory stop asking for suggestions

In many areas of the directory such as gambling, travel and limos, that would be a good idea because approaching 100% of the suggestions are spam.

and start crawling the web yourselves.

Editors (not robots) already search for websites to list. How else would a small village category such as Lamorna (created yesterday) get built?

Ammalgam · Oct 30, 2009

jimnoble said:
Yet another misconception. Google crawls the web and will index pretty much whatever it finds. Any evaluation that it does is algorithmic with no regard to 'usefulness'.

xxxx - Semantic Correction: I said "looking", I didnt say crawl the web "indexing". the ultimate goal of indexing everything is to find the quality/useful sites.

In many areas of the directory such as gambling, travel and limos, that would be a good idea because approaching 100% of the suggestions are spam.

xxxxx -ok

Editors (not robots) already search for websites to list. How else would a small village category such as Lamorna (created yesterday) get built?

xxxxx - um ok

pvgool · Oct 30, 2009

Ammalgam said:
Simplify your terms of service and state "Please send us your suggestions but note that we will never get back to you, will review your suggestion over a period of years and may never list your suggestion". If that phrase sounds a little crazy, you might want to think about it because that is basically what you are saying on here.

That is already on our guidelines, just in some different words.
see http://www.dmoz.org/add.html

Depending on factors such as the volume of submissions to the particular category, it may take several weeks or more before your submission is reviewed

Please recognize that making the ODP a useful resource requires us to exercise broad editorial discretion in determining the content and structure of the directory. That discretion extends (but is not limited) to what sites to include, where in the directory sites are placed, whether and when to include more than one link to a site, when deep linking is appropriate, and the content of the title and description of the site. In addition, a site's placement in the directory is subject to change or deletion at any time at our sole discretion. You should not rely on any aspect of a site's inclusion in the directory. Please understand that an editor's exercise of discretion may not always treat all submissions equally. You may not always agree with our choices, but we hope you recognize that we do our best to make fair and reasonable decisions.

Ammalgam · Oct 30, 2009

This is true

and you left out

The Open Directory team welcomes comments and feedback about the directory generally. Please let us know what you think, and how we can improve the service. Thanks!

Ironically, when a bunch of users complain that feedback or timeliness is what we want (aka feedback), we are treated like lepers.

If you guys want feedback, you are getting it. If you don't like what you hear, dont take it out on us. The previous moderators (Hutcheson and Pvgoo) sound like we (visitors) irritate them with our whining.

DMOZ claims to be an OPEN directory.

I understand all that has been explained in this thread and I accept it but maybe you guys can make peace with the fact that these questions will always be asked and be more understanding to those people who ask them.

Big surprise, geeky people don't read directions/disclaimers or instructions extensively so we usually miss the small print. Still not an excuse to be testy with us.

In sales and/or support, it's not what you say but how you say it.

At the end of the day, you run the directory and don't accept a fee so you can do pretty much whatever you want but there is a lot of frustration out there regarding the issues raised.

It is what it is.

Respectfully.

pvgool said:
That is already on our guidelines, just in some different words.
see http://www.dmoz.org/add.html

Depending on factors such as the volume of submissions to the particular category, it may take several weeks or more before your submission is reviewed

Please recognize that making the ODP a useful resource requires us to exercise broad editorial discretion in determining the content and structure of the directory. That discretion extends (but is not limited) to what sites to include, where in the directory sites are placed, whether and when to include more than one link to a site, when deep linking is appropriate, and the content of the title and description of the site. In addition, a site's placement in the directory is subject to change or deletion at any time at our sole discretion. You should not rely on any aspect of a site's inclusion in the directory. Please understand that an editor's exercise of discretion may not always treat all submissions equally. You may not always agree with our choices, but we hope you recognize that we do our best to make fair and reasonable decisions.

jimnoble · Oct 30, 2009

That would seem to be a natural conclusion of the thread. Closing.

My software site has not been listed

Ammalgam

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hutcheson

Ammalgam

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pvgool

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Ammalgam

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jimnoble

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Ammalgam

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jimnoble

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Ammalgam

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pvgool

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Ammalgam

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