>even tougher for people who get no feedback, nothing, and their site may not be listed EVER.
I don't see this at all. You spend a few minutes volunteering (that is, finding a category and suggesting a site.) That's not tough at all. You don't have to offer any kind of personal information or "bona fides" or pass a test or anything. Nobody cares whether you're a spammer, nobody cares whether you have an ounce of good faith or public spirit. Nobody offered you anything for this, nobody promised you anything, you simply go on with your life as if the ODP had never existed. How could it be easier?
Or, you can go on from there in a different direction: demonstrate your interest in the mission of the project, demonstrate minimal competence, demonstrate your own good faith -- and you're an editor, with the privileges of making changes directly, and all kinds of constructive feedback from your peers.
It's not tough for anyone. The mechanism empowers people so far as it can trust them. If you don't feel it empowers you enough, or if you feel it asks too much in exchange, then you don't participate -- you go somewhere else, like your own website, to do the same thing differently, or to do some other thing that the ODP doesn't empower you to do.
There is no "tough".
The only way it could possibly be tough is if you tried to control the ODP community for your own nefarious purposes. And ... yeah, that be REAL tough, and many conscientious editors work hard to make it tougher.
And ... what are you going to do with feedback anyway? If you're an amateur promoting your own site, you're going to read the rules and only suggest it once, right? If you have any other related sites, you'll link them from your first site, and not suggest them, just like the rules say, right? (We cannot impose any responsibility on you, but -- if you're a spammer, and we don't want to talk to you, and you don't deserve to hear from us.)
But, but ... how about those professional webdesigners or SEOers who suggest lots of sites? Don't they deserve feedback?
No. They. Do. Not.
I'm an amateur, I do what I do as well as I can, and people can accept my help if it's good enough for them. But -- those professionals have a professional duty to understand the ODP rules backward and forward and tell their clients the truth, which is either (1) "I know what I'm doing, and I'll suggest your site if it's listable. This site isn't listable, don't bother. That site is listable, but you never know how long it'll take to get listed: they're volunteers, working on their own priorities, not mine. THAT site probably isn't listable, but I'll submit it anyway if you're into dishonest. The editors may list it, but don't count on in staying listed?" or (2) "I don't understand the ODP: I can take your money but in my ignorance and sloth I have neglected to take any steps to understand the ODP guidelines. I have no clue whether this site is listable, so I am totally at the mercy of volunteers to whom I have always been contemptuous and rude, and who had no sympathy for me and my work to begin with. You can do the research and suggest your site yourself, or you can look for some competent person to do your SEO work. But I am not going to take any steps to acquire the basic professional competence that you probably think you have a right to expect, just because YOU'RE PAYING ME MONEY!"
We have no sympathy, no sympathy at all for people like that, who'll take other people's money but do nothing at all to earn it -- and THEN complain about how EDITORS aren't doing THEIR responsibility!
