Question

Hi
I wonder if any editors can assist me?

I manage a very large Travel & Tourism site for a country. We had the main URL (i.e. the index page - main home page) listed in the correct category on DMOZ since the site started in 1999. This was of course great and we were very grateful for this.

Subsequent to that, I've now noticed that arbitrary pages of the site have been included in DMOZ in other, arbitrary categories. For example we have a wildlife section that describes some of the wildlife in this country, and someone submitted one of the pages (about Jackals) to a category which is totally unrelated to what our actual site is about. (The category is: Kids and Teens: School Time: Science: Living Things: Animals: Mammals: Hyenas )
I can assure you we never did that as we value our DMOZ listing and wouldn't jeopardise it by submitting to unrelated categories. I suspect someone from the public, interested in wildlife, may have done that, I really don't know what else to think about that listing.

The crux of the matter is, we have 6 listings for the site in DMOZ, all of them in very odd or unimportant (to us) categories, but the MAIN URL listing has completely disappeared.

Can anyone advise why DMOZ editors would have done that? If they thought we were spamming the directory, surely they would have removed ALL the listings? That is why I am so confused.

I have resubmitted the site but to no avail. So I just wanted to get some feedback before I start asking in the forum when the site will be listed. I really don't want to annoy the editors especially if they already think we were submitting more than a fair share of pages.

Many thanks for reading this....
Regards
Candy

Well, in general terms, editors have more discretion on listing deeplinks of a site when category building than submitters do. Sub sections of a site that are specific to a category, and contain unique information, are frequently added by editors.

They are rarely suggested, although as you point out any member of the public can suggest a site if they feel it will be usefull (and quite often the independent submitter will have many sites about a category they have tracked down in researching the subject).

Taking a guess based on your cryptic clues you are talking about http://www.zambiatourism.com/ which is listed exactly where I'd expect it to be - http://dmoz.org/Regional/Africa/Zambia/Travel_and_Tourism and it has been listed there since August 2001.

If it's a different site - it might have been unreviewed by our automated link checker if the site was down when checked at least twice within a 2 week period.
It might have been moved to a different category if the site was re classified by an editor.
It might have been removed as a mirror of another listed site.

Lots of possibilities. But the only way to know is to ask in the submission status forum, providing both the url and a clickable link to the category.

:tree:

I would guess your site is http://www.sa-venues.com/

Whatever it is, I've been through each of the listings in Kids_and_Teens/School_Time/Science/Living_Things/Animals/Mammals/Hyenas and I didn't see one of them on Jackals. So I think you're wrong about that aspect.

I'd like to reiterate what gimmster said, the only way to know for sure is if you provide the url and category.

Thank you

Hi Gimmster & Ishtar

Thanks so much for taking the trouble to reply, I know you have better things to do so I really appreciate the fact that not just one but two editors actually responded. (You DMOZ editors are really awesome giving your free time to not only edit for the directory but to take the time to read our posts! - Thank you!)

I made a mistake when I wrote Jackals, It is in fact Hyenas.
And the Hyena page from our site is listed in this category:
http://dmoz.org/Kids_and_Teens/School_Time/Science/Living_Things/Animals/Mammals/Hyenas/

You are quite correct Ishtar (are you super-sleuth?) the site is http://www.SA-Venues.com

I've just done a search on DMOZ and had a look at all the listings for the site and see that the German Version of the site which is www.Suedafrika-Reise.net is on that list. It is a completely different site, its own content in German Language, its own unique domain name and even a different design, so I am not sure why it is listed under SA-Venues and has that title - I know that I never submitted that site - that is not the description I would have used, albeit it a great description. I've submitted an update request for that now. (Could THAT site be the reason our main site www.SA-Venues.com was removed?).

The SA-Venues.com site used to be listed in the following categories where it now no longer is:
http://dmoz.org/Regional/Africa/South_Africa/Travel_and_Tourism/ (Where we originally submitted it to)
AND
http://dmoz.org/Regional/Africa/South_Africa/Travel_and_Tourism/Accommodation/Directories/
Either of which are appropriate although (and this is just my opinion) I think the first category is probably more appropriate.

What do you suggest, should I write and ask for all the other listings to be removed, but then I run the risk of of maybe never being listed in the Directory at all if they reject the new application?

Thanks again very much, I do appreciate your responses.
I've often thought of applying to be an editor but always thought it may be unethical seeing as we manage this site - unfortunately my knowledge of Travel & Tourism is limited to South Africa so I would be quite useless at editing any other country.

Kind regards
Candy

Answerting the subquestion on the german site: We like to list sites by company-title. Especially in spam-loaded areas like the one your site is in. That helps a lot with reducing our workload.

Hi Windharp

Thanks so much for responding.
Only problem is that that is not the company name. But as long as that is not affecting our main site's entry in DMOZ then I really don't mind how it is listed, I'm grateful that it is. Thank you!

Thanks again for taking the time to respond.

Your site copyright page says: COPYRIGHT © 1999 - 2004 SA-VENUES.COM / SUEDAFRIKA-REISE.NET

I would think the title is based on that as the company name.

Precisely, the second part of that is Suedafrika-Reise.net which is THIS sites name & company name. German people wouldn't understand SA-Venues, that is why it should be changed.

Several issues. (1) We wouldn't be interested in a request to remove pages that were still good, on-topic resources. You can force us to, easily enough, by shuffling your navigation around so that our links break -- a couple of times, and we get the hint. But I would recommend that you not do that. For one thing, if your site navigation works, each of those extra listings attracts more visitors and adds page rank to your site (assuming your navigation works). For another, I don't remember ANY case where editor-selected deeplinks precluded the main site from getting listed. Sometimes the deeplinks get listed first -- that merely means they are about topics that are of more interest to our sampling of surfers.

(2) However, there have been deeplinks of the site submitted. Please do not do that either. The editor's guidelines allow editors to pick exceptional content out of a site for listing, based on what content surfers NEED; the submitter's policies wisely do not allow such latitudes. You tell us about the site, we'll make of it what we can (including deeplinks where they are of value to surfers, not webmasters.) The deeplinks that were SUBMITTED but NOT listed DID cause you trouble -- UNLIKE the deeplinks you mention that were NOT submitted and WERE listed, which did NOT cause you trouble.

(3) So long as the description of a business site is in the target language, we aren't concerned about the business name. We really have an overriding need to be able to track multiple URLs from the same company--this is a big problem, and we have to cause many inconveniences it causes. On the other hand, we are very accustomed to seeing company names in one language for a website in another--and do not see this as a problem at all, merely part the normal situation in a multi-cultural web.

(4) The main site can be considered for listing somewhere. Right now it is waiting review in http://www.sa-venues.com/ . In most of the directory it is unusual, but not unknown, for the main site not to be listed but deeplinks to be listed. It is probably most common (or least unusual) in travel categories, where everybody claims to cover the globe but most do it only that a few atoms deep. In these cases we pick out the deeper pools, rather than burden our surfers with lots of sites with mostly very shallow content. Note: I'm not saying this WILL happen with THIS site, I'm just saying that is one of the editors' options.

We'll look at the main site again. It is not necessary to submit it again, and please don't submit deeplinks of it.

Thanks Hutcheson, I appreciate the response, that certainly covers all my questions and we certainly won't submit anything else, we are only interested in getting the main URL listed.

Thanks again

Correction: site is waiting in http://dmoz.org/Regional/Africa/South_Africa/Travel_and_Tourism/Travel_Guides .