Status of http://www.ne-design.net

I think I updated my URL's listing from http://ne-design.net to http://WWW.ne-design.net one late night but am unsure. I want to confirm that I am in the que or whatever you call it waiting for my turn. Like others I am very eager.

Could someone confirm this, I wouldn't want to be annoying and send another request to update form.

Any advice is welcome from other members here, I am a newbie.

Thanks,

Aaron @ www.ne-design.net

Read the forum guidelines and add a clickable link to the category you submitted to.

URL: http://ne-design.net ( needs to be changed to http://www.ne-design.net )
Link: http://dmoz.org/Shopping/Home_and_Garden/Garden_Accessories/Irrigation/

Affordable Rain Barrel

I hope this helps, thanks!

-Aaron

Yes, your update request of 22 Aug 2003 is awaiting review.

However, since both URLs work, a reviewing editor would have no real motivation to change it. If, for some reason, you really, really want the "www." added, you should probably consider having http://ne-design.net permanently redirect to http://www.ne-design.net . That way, an editor would definitely make the change. As it stands now, many editors wouldn't bother.

Please allow at least one month before requesting another status update in this thread.

...needs to be changed ...

In fact, there is no such need apparent to the site reviewer.

In fact, there is no such need apparent...

hutcheson~

Google is not able to notice that http://www.ne-design.net and http://ne-design.net are actually the same web site. Most webmasters include the www in their link to the web site. Google thinks that there are 2 web sites and is therefore splitting up the link popularity over 2 urls. This results in all links from other web sites showing up for www.ne-design.net and the link from dmoz.org showing up for ne-design.net. This hurts the position in the search engines, especially the very important search engine Google. Changing the link in dmoz.org to http://www.ne-design.net will result in the total link popularity of the web site to be combined and thus improving the rankings in Google, which uses dmoz as a very important source for its index.

So you are telling me that my request will most likely be ignored?

I contacted my web host to request a 301 redirect and he deleted my entire site by mistake yesterday.

Re: In fact, there is no such need apparent...

I am just repeating what we say all the time: We don't care for link population. We don't care for PR. We are not doing a directory for webmasters to list their sites.

We want to use the least energy to bring the best directoryx to the enduser. He has to be able to reach the information we find usefull to link.

Is there anything that can be done?

When people do a search for "rain barrel" they are looking to find and purchase a rain barrel. It just happens that if you do not have back links (and believe me I hate having to find people to link me) Google ranks your index where it will never be seen. I then am not able to reach people and all this is worthless.

I do not fully understand how this all works yet but it seems to be broken.

Re: Is there anything that can be done?

It just happens that if you do not have back links ...

Click to expand...

Completely right, but not our concern. We care for our directory only.

[And no, discussing with us won't lead to anything. It may or may not be done eventually]

Re: Is there anything that can be done?

I understand both sides but as a person trying getting my head above water to sell a few rain barrels this really stinks.

Could I remove myself from the directory than resubmit the correct URL sometime? Would that work? Does anyone have any more ideas?

I am looking into the 301 redirect thing; I hope this will encourage a dmoz editor to edit or Google to forget about dmoz all together.

I feel that I might have done the wrong thing submitting my incorrect url. Looks like dmoz can either help or hinder, am I correct in my new understanding?

[I understand that me posting here will not encourage anyone to edit my url in the directory. I am here to gain understanding of how things work and will continue to post until it makes sense. I have to admit that i'm getting a little frustrated with it all]

Thanks,

-Aaron

Re: Is there anything that can be done?

>So you are telling me that my request will most likely be ignored?

Very possibly.

>I contacted my web host to request a 301 redirect and he deleted my entire site by mistake yesterday.

Aargh. I hate it when that happens. Did you get the techie-wannabe's scalp?

The 301, assume your TW can get it right, will cause your URL to be flagged by Robozilla for personal attention. No guarantee (editors make mistakes) but IMO the correct action for the editor to take in that case would be to update the URL to the new target of the redirection -- which is what you want.

This might happen even without your "update URL" request, but the combination of both "301" and "update URL" covers your bases. Also, check back here in, say, a couple of months -- we will probably have seen Robozilla in the meantime.

Ok thanks!

Ok, thank you hutcheson for taking the extra time to sum it all up for me and you are correct about that eager underpaid techie-wannabe. That is what happens when corporate America lays-off all the smart IT folks and replaces them with car salesmen. They sure sound like they know what is going on until they delete all your hard work. Luckily I had a backup but I lost all my stats. I also still can not find anyone there who knows what a 301 redirect is. In fact, that is what caused the guy to delete my site.

I said "Hello, do you know what a 301 redirect is, if not can I talk with someone does"?

Techie Wannabee said (with a long pause before he spoke) "Hooooold on sir, let me help you here”…

I could hear him nervously clicking instructional windows (like a monkey) on his screen until he found something he thought was correct. He then told me to do this and that on my end until my site was toast.

When I asked him if we just screwed stuff up he exclaimed loudly "Sir, I didn't screw anything up...you did"!!! He then was noticeably angry at his failure.

I calmly said "I am sorry that you are now covering your a$$..." and right at the word a$$ my cell phone battery ran out.

I then spent the rest of the night on the phone fixing stuff, but I am used to it, my entire newbie website building experience has been like this.

I will also beat a drum today in hopes that my URL will be edited though the last time I did it rained for two weeks.

Take care,

-Aaron

Oh no!!!

Oh no, things were going great, someone here (thank you!) edited my url and it is listed as www.ne-design.net in DMOZ. I was ranked in the top 10 for rain barrel(s) for weeks. Then this morning I check google and I am 21? I can now only find listings for www.ne-design.net as "ne-design.net". I thought I had finally overcome the curse.

What the heck happened? Does anyone have an explanation? Not even a SEO fella I know can figure this one out! Almost all my backlinks are listed with a www, my head is about to explode. :-(

Re: Oh no!!!

We are not Google and have no control over what they do with either their own, or our data (other than attribution).

Your site is still listed with the www in http://dmoz.org/Shopping/Home_and_Garden/Garden_Accessories/Irrigation/ .

That's all we can help you with.

It turns out that....

Thanks Gimmster, it turns out the my webhost (www.godaddy.com) is screwing its customers with a lame 302 redirect when we need 301's. Search engines see two sites: http://ne-design.net and http://www.ne-design.net so Google drops the higher ranked site and you are toast!

If you are interested in reading about this is from another forum. It shows that ALL Godaddy customers are getting reamed.

An interesting thread at WebmasterWorld caught my attention tonight. It deals with Go Daddy using a 302 redirect instead of a 301 redirect. Difference? A 302 is technically 'temporarily moved' while a 301 is 'moved permanently.' Google is seeing parked domains forwarded with a 302 redirect by Go Daddy, resulting in duplicate content on separate domains.

One of the posters (against their TOS, I believe) posted the contents of an email from GoDaddy saying they wouldn't change how they redirect pages at this time thank you very much.

I can't vouch for its authenticity so take it with a mouse of salt, but here is the alleged letter from GoDaddy concerning the matter:

Thank you for your patience in this matter. I have talked with the proper department about this and unfortunately we will not be changing the way we redirect/forward domain names at this time. We do apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and I have given your suggestion to the appropriate department for consideration in the future.

Please let us know if we can help you in any other way.

Sincerely,
Go Daddy Software

Click to expand...

-----------------------------------------

I am about to lose my head. Thank God I have a wife with some income, we would be homeless!

Do you have an icon with a red steaming demon spawn head? That is how I currently feel. Oh that's right, you don't care, that is the right response a good editor should have correct?

I actually understand your point of view and now my focus is on these hacks. I wonder if ALL the folks can sue for lost time/money and brain cells? Like useual there is probably only 1% of the people noticing this huge issue so Godaddy doesn't respond. (They don't care)

Thanks for your time and for giving me my WWW, maybe after I find a new host I can sell a few rain barrels and feed the cats.

No

one

cares

good

night!

Re: It turns out that....

We're sympathetic, there's just nothing we can do about it. Why don't you try a Google forum?

Re: It turns out that....

We're sympathetic, there's just nothing we can do about it. Why don't you try a Google forum?

Click to expand...

E-mailing Google and visiting forums produced nothing but "go ask someone else responses" nobody, not even my SEO or the webmaster at my new host want to deal with this. I can feel their nervousness because they do not have a complete answer. The only one who could really give me an answer is someone who understands the Google algorithm directly but I can't even get an email to go threw the "go look in other forums we are busy" auto-response at Google.

I did notice that lots of people think Google and its love affair with DMOZ is doing some strange stuff to page rank and position but they can not put their finger on it either. It again is most likely the typical human response that happens when people can not find an answer and feel beat.

I'm surprised at the people who I once considered masters at this stuff. They are lacking insight into this. Yes edting .htaccess files and 301 redirects might help but this in incomplete and inconclusive. There has to be someone who can explain it outside of the Google/DMOZ family.

Yoda?

Bah!

Re: It turns out that....

For discussions related to google they have that user supported discussion group - whatever this may be worth.

Re: It turns out that....

Thanks, I am now getting repsonses from the google staff and am working hard to point out this error. They are just about getting it I believe (we will see what they have to say in the next email)

Sorry to bother you all though I still want my site listed as "Affordable Rain Barrel" in DMOZ not "Affordable" BUT the URL "www.ne-design.net" is now in there so I can not bitch too much.

I am in the que again.

Take care and try to remain human, ;-)

-Aaron

Re: It turns out that....

If you want your title changed you should change your web site so that the visible title is what you want, before submitting an update request. As it is, the way the web site looks, the title could be either Affordable or Rain Barrel, depending on how an editor looks at it. A diligent editor, seeing that the word Affordable appears at the bottom of the page as the apparent company name, would choose Affordable.