Remove my site from dmoz.org listings

[sorry for the back-to-back posts, but since so much more was posted while I was composing the last one...]

My plan is to redirect people coming from dmoz.org pages to a special page in which I will rant against the ODP

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Ranting on your site is, of course, your prerogative, just as keeping the listing for your site is ours. We have no problem with anti-ODP views. In fact we even list some in http://dmoz.org/Home/Consumer_Information/Computers_and_Internet/Internet/Directories/Open_Directory_Project/ .

We don't require everyone to agree with the ODP. Like I said, content is all we care about.

There is no reason for me to block the other sites you have listed because my only goal is to reduce the value of the Beowulf category in ODP

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I honestly can't conceive of any way that you might reduce the "value" of the category in any way that the ODP would care about, just by ranting, but, like I said, it's your site, and you're welcome to do whatever you wish with it.

It is not true that personalities and biases do not enter into the equation in managing categories at ODP.

Personalities and biases obviously entered into it when M***0 refused to negotiate with me, and when the editors above him refused to talk to me.

And the personalities and biases of tyrannical editors were the reason why many past editors have abandoned the project. You are kidding yourself if you think that you can run a project like this without being influenced by personalities and biases.

My plan is to redirect people coming from dmoz.org pages to a special page in which I will rant against the ODP, and then let them continue on to my site.

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If you make it a good enough rant, maybe we'll mention it in the description.

my only goal is to reduce the value of the Beowulf category in ODP

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I still don't see the point. It's not like many people use the ODP directly. Our product is the information which is distributed via the RDF to downstream data users. You just want to annoy the few users who do arrive at your site via the ODP?

I simply want to point out to users of the Beowulf category at dmoz.org that I object to the way the listings at dmoz.org are managed.

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Is your objection to the way the listings are handled, or the way your particular case was handled? They are two different things.

The ODP has guidelines for listings. Looking at the editing logs, what you originally did was against the guidelines. Not that your method of organizing was not a valid method, but that it wasn't the one chosen to use in the ODP. Perhaps you didn't understand that the guidelines were actually important to be followed, I don't know. But the point is that in order to keep 60,000 editors producing a consistent product, they needed to be followed. In your own site/directory, you can make up your own rules. To edit in the ODP, you need to follow the ODP rules.

I still think that the root of this problem comes down to miscommunication, but from your comments, I don't think you're open to understanding. 3 1/2 years is a long time to hold a grudge. Glad you have the stamina.

Are you people deliberately pretending to misunderstand my motivation just to annoy me?

I am not trying to prevent other search engines from using ODP information. I am only trying to annoy people who use the Beowulf category at ODP to get to my site. I want people who use dmoz.org listings for their personal use to realize that some people object to the way those listings are managed, and I want them to know that you refused to remove my page from your list.

Within a day or two I should be able to redirect all requests from your Beowulf listing to my page at http://www.jagular.com/beowulf/dmoz.shtml

>My plan is to redirect people coming from dmoz.org pages to a special page in which I will rant against the ODP

It is your site, and you have a right to use your influence (fairly earned by your Beowulf content) in any way you wish.

I don't think it's something worth doing, but I won't complain.

I am only trying to annoy people who use the Beowulf category at ODP to get to my site.

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Thanks for explaining.

I realize that ODP has a policy of how directories should be managed. I have already said above that people can disagree on how to manage information. My problem is that M***0 was tyrannical and insensitive in the way he reorganized hours of my work without so much as discussing it with me first, and then everyone else at ODP ignored my objections to what he had done.

I only want to annoy the people who use ODP directly. If that turns out to be only a few people then that's fine. I object to the way that the organization of that particular list was managed, and so I only want to rant to people who use that particular list.

You have suggested that 3 1/2 years is a long time. That is my point about consequences: mismangement of ODP can have long term consequences; that's why you have to be careful of what you are doing. I am not the only person who holds a 3 1/2 year grudge against this project. There are plenty of other former category editors who want nothing to do with ODP now because of what happened to them years ago.

I am not trying to prevent other search engines from using ODP information. I am only trying to annoy people who use the Beowulf category at ODP to get to my site.

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But you are missing the point, the point being is that not that many people use dmoz.org as the starting point, so blocking that, won't get your rant to many people.

I suggest you look at http://dmoz.org/Computers/Internet/Searching/Directories/Open_Directory_Project/Sites_Using_ODP_Data/ for all the other site that you need to add to your list. And also you need to add all the non-English sites listed below that.

And you need to add Google http://directory.google.com/Top/Arts/Literature/World_Literature/British/Medieval/Beowulf/?il=1

You are the ones who are missing the point.

I only want to rant to people who use ODP as the starting point.

Times change. The ODP grows and changes too. Thinking that the situation in the ODP is static simply limits your understanding of how things are now. You'll note that we aren't all jumping up and down to claim that you were treated fairly, or that you weren't. It was so long ago and the players and culture so different now that not only can we not really address your situation, it would be pointless to try because the circumstances are different now.

I think you missed my point about holding grudges, but I find I can't think of anything to explain myself better. *shrug*

I only want to rant to people who use ODP as the starting point.

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After the initial flurry of editors visiting out of curiousity, you'll have to come back in a few months and tell us how many people you actually got to rant at.

It would be easy for ODP editors to confirm that I am really Syd Allan, and that I really want my entry deleted, by simply writing to the email address listed at the bottom of every page on my site.

Also, I realize that I said above that I don't want to add value to anything done by ODP, and that this caused confusion about whether I want to somehow affect Google crawlers. In fact, the only thing I am trying to do is affect the people who use the Beowulf list at dmoz.org for their own personal use.

It looks to me as if this category attracts editors who have trouble with the management.

[Removed references to confidential internal ODP information - motsa]

I have never suggested that the situation at the ODP is static. What I have suggested is that bad management has long term consequences. The people running ODP now have inherited it from the people who ran it before, and they have also inherited whatever impressions people had of ODP in past years.

To suggest that ODP is better managed now does not eliminate the problem of how it was managed before. You have inherited a problem of perception caused by past editors, and you can't make that perception change simply by announcing that three years have passed.

This is getting really boring. The two main points have been covered over and again. They are:

1. Decisions about listing a site should be made solely on the basis of the content of that site. The wishes of the webmaster, whether for inclusion or for exclusion, should not be a factor.

2. Nobody here disputes your right to express any opinion you choose on your site, nor to we dispute your right to selectively serve that opinion based on referrer id.

Unless somebody has something truly new to add, I don't see much point in continuing this discussion.

So let me see if I have this straight:

1. You join the ODP, read the guidelines and begin editing.
2. You know, by reading the guidelines, that the rules are that you should do it a certain way, but you decide unilaterally to break the rules and do it your own way.
3. Another editor who also has permission to edit in that category rearranges the category to comply with the rules.
4. You complain to this editor about the fact the he fixed your category to be the way the "management" at ODP wants it.
5. The editor replies to you eventually, explaining that he followed the rules and that you should too even if you don't like them.
6. You complain to other, higher editors about this editor, who was doing what he was supposed to do according to the rules, and they, being busy people and also being volunteers much like you, ignore you, which isn't surprising when you are essentially complaining about someone who followed the rules you were breaking.
7. You then go into a 3-1/2 year childish temper tantrum because you didn't get your way, culminating in this quite long forum thread.

The only reason I'm posting here is because, contrary to our guidelines, an editor's name has been mentioned here, and he has basically been dragged through the mud. The specifics about that editor are hardly important, the one thing you can be sure of is that he has added many good, useful sites to the ODP over many years, and he hardly deserves the condemnation of someone who apparently is angry because he didn't get his way.

What I have suggested is that bad management has long term consequences.

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The long term consequences of that management is that the ODP now has over 4 million websites listed and provides data that is used all over the Internet, and by some pretty big names in the search business. If we had instead managed the directory in such a way as to allow everyone to have their way, there would be no directory today.

My suggestion to you would be to examine your own position and figure out how logical it actually is. If you then still continue to feel the way you do, so be it. It will hardly make a difference to the ODP; just to you.

Really. If you want to rant, help yourself. Why you would come here and basically dare us to stop you is beyond me. Why would we want to stop you? We believe in freedom of speech. Knock yourself out. You don't need our permission.

It's been pointed out that your rant won't reach a very broad audience this way, but that's your own business; I'm sure you know how to publicize your opinions better than that if you wanted to.

*shrug*

You miss a key point in your numbered list of the various aspects of this situation: that ODP is supposed to be a cooperative effort, and that <snip/> and other editors at ODP ignored their responsibility to make some effort to cooperate with someone who obviously knew something about the subject matter, and who had obviously made a sincere effort to organize a directory that no one was managing.

You describe the ODP policies as if they are written into the U.S. Constitution, and as if they are perfectly clear to all new editors, and as if they cannot ever be adjusted under any circumstances.

You can complain about my mentioning <snip?/ by name, but he brought that on himself by being so insensitive in my dealings with him. He has to understand that his actions have consequences, and the consequences in this case are that I am going to tell people that I don't like what he did.

No - take responsibility for your actions.

1. You flagrantly violated the rules of this forum - you are the one that posted the editor name.

2. As clearly stated, when you were an editor, you went against other editors and decided to do things your own way.

Hopefully by now you get the idea that you are not going to get your request met here. So why don't you go and put your complaints in writing on your website so the world can see them.

I did not "go against" the other editors. I edited the directory as I thought it should be without receiving any prior advice from anyone. I did not deliberately violate any ODP conventions. It was clear that I was a new editor, and so I should have been given some leeway to make inappropriate choices in my initial work. It was insensitive of the other editors to simply bulldoze over me.