status update for http://www.kyero.com please

submitted at the end of september to either http://www.dmoz.org/Regional/Europe/Spain/Business_and_Economy/Real_Estate/Directories/ or http://www.dmoz.org/Regional/Europe/Spain/Autonomous_Communities/Andalucia/Business_and_Economy/Real_Estate/ (sorry can't remember which one)

Your submission of 06/Oct/2003 is awaiting review in http://dmoz.org/Regional/Europe/Spain/Business_and_Economy/Real_Estate/Directories along with fewer than two dozen others.

great, thanks

Am I nearly there yet?

The submission is still pending review.

Any idea how long till the site gets reviewed?

Impossible to predice. All of the editors are volunteers and work to the beat of their individual drums.

Can you tell me how much the queue has decreased since the start of december? (fewer than two dozen on the 3rd Dec)

I'm sorry, but the number of unreviewed sites waiting doesn't say anything about the length of time until review for any single site, so we have changed our policy and stopped giving out numbers.

status update please for http://www.kyero.com

Also, since posting in October, the coverage of the site has changed to a number of regions of Spain and I think I suggested a category in Andalucia - if it's still pending, a broader category would be more appropriate

The editor will make the final placement decision at the time of evaluation/review.

Please do not resubmit.

OK thanks, I won't resubmit. Any idea when the evaluation/review is likely to be?

Since the ODP is based on voluntary work, we can't give any estimates. Sorry.

I understand it's a voluntary thing but I thought that answering that single question was the entire reason for this particular thread? Is there any thing you can tell me about the status of this submission?

I realise it's hard to give timescales but I don't understand how a submission date of over 5 months ago can lead to being in a queue of fewer than a dozen sites about 2 months ago to not being appreciably any closer today.

I'm sure you're all working flat out but it just looks like a black hole from the outside. I'm guess you've considered making basic submission status information available - it would certainly help me and save you the bother of responding to annoying questions like mine. - just a thought.

martindell said:

I understand it's a voluntary thing but I thought that answering that single question was the entire reason for this particular thread? Is there any thing you can tell me about the status of this submission?

I realise it's hard to give timescales but I don't understand how a submission date of over 5 months ago can lead to being in a queue of fewer than a dozen sites about 2 months ago to not being appreciably any closer today.

I'm sure you're all working flat out but it just looks like a black hole from the outside. I'm guess you've considered making basic submission status information available - it would certainly help me and save you the bother of responding to annoying questions like mine. - just a thought.

Click to expand...

Since suggestions are not processed in a FIFO queue there is no possible way to tell when an editor will take an interest in the particular category a particular site is waiting review in. Such an expectation was the reason we stopped providing queue sizes, as there is no relationship between queue size, date submitted, and date of review.

Status is not 'your site will probably be reviewed on <date>'
Status can be:
Waiting for review in the category provided
Waiting for review in <different category>
Moved to <different category> where it is waiting review
Declined

That's as basic as status can be. Prior to the existence of this forum (it's less than 2 years old) there was an even greater perception of a 'Black Hole'. This is an editor based, in addition to their editing, attempt at providing some public feedback. We are sorry if it does not meet your expectations, but it's the best there is.

As far as not working I can see over 100,000 sites waiting for review just in the Regional tree. Any particular group of 25 or 250 sites are fairly much lost in amongst the total. We all work on what takes our interest at the time, eventually we try to get to all the sites, obviously sometimes there is quite a delay.

If the site is in the wrong place and gets moved it may have to wait just as long again. Sites may be reviewed 10 minutes after submitting, the suggestion determined to be in the wrong category, and sent off to a category that an editor has just finished listing every site in, to wait for another review, which may not happen for a year or more.

All you can do is accept that once we acknowledge we have received the suggestion, you just have to wait. Check occasionally by all means, but asking every 1st of the month will not speed up listing. Every few months is more realistic.

:tree:

thanks, I didn't realise it wasn't a FIFO sort of a system - that explains a lot. I'll stop bothering you now. BTW, do I get to know if my submission is outright rejected? that way I can just wait for the rejection notice or assume it's acceptance in time

martindell said:

I understand it's a voluntary thing but I thought that answering that single question was the entire reason for this particular thread? Is there any thing you can tell me about the status of this submission?

Click to expand...

Yes - that it is still waiting for review in http://dmoz.org/Regional/Europe/Spain/Business_and_Economy/Real_Estate/Directories/ .

We are all volunteers - that is the basis of the entire directory. We are free to work in whatever area of the directory we want to (provided we have the right permissions), and to donate as much or as little time as we want to the project. The flip side of the coin is that while in many parts of the directory submitted sites are reviewed in a matter of days, many other areas go untended for months. In addition, there tends to be an inverse proportion between the number of submissions a category receives and the number of editors with permissions to edit therein (not to mention the inclination to do so.)

On the other hand, many thousands of sites are reviewed daily, and a significant proportion of them are added to the directory. So when we say that we can't give you a time estimate, it's not because we don't want to - it is literally impossible even to guess.

BTW, do I get to know if my submission is outright rejected?

Click to expand...

No, of course not. You wouldn't suggest a site you think will be rejected, would you? From our point of view there simply is no need to inform people who suggest sites we don't want to list of a rejection.

I'm just trying to figure out a way of knowing what's going on without bugging you. If I don't find out when I've been accepted or rejected, some alternative way of an individual being able to review the status of their submissions would be a good idea, don't you think. Imagine all the time you'd save not responding to me!

Your question is perfectly valid. It would seem to be an obvious solution. The topic has been discussed here, and internally within ODP many times. For many reasons, it seems unlikely to happen.

Some but not all of the reasons are:

The requirement to establish an opt-in email system to avoid ODP issuing email responses that might be perceived as spam.

Increased load on the servers.

Avoiding notifying abusive submitters of their rejection, so that they can automate another submission to spam us.

Limitations of the underlying database for ODP.

Lack of paid technical staff who are already overworked.