There must me some logic behind this…

Dear Editors (another dumb question, I guess).

How is it possible that a category does not accept new editors and, at the same time, the number of links in it has not changed during, at least, a month…

First time I submitted a link to the category about 4 months ago. Checked the status after a month – no track of the submission.
Editor:
“I have checked the category you mention and every subcategories and cannot find this suggestion. Nor can I find evidence of an editor having ever reviewed it.”

Resubmitted at the end of February, checked status after a moth…
Editor:
“I see no submission for this URL in that category, nor any record of it being moved or reviewed… please resubmit”.
Well I did. All 3 times got “Submission Received” massage. Based on the previous results the chances to see it are, probably, very remote.

I understand that “free” service drives specific quality and level of commitment, but still there must be some logic I, probably, do not get.
The category I am talking about:
http://www.dmoz.org/Business/Marketing_and_Advertising/Market_Research/

Thank you in advance for reading
Alex

The size of the category makes it unlikely a new editor would be allowed to jump in and edit there.

As for why no change... Tuesday, April 27, 2004 is the date of the most recent edit in the category. It's an area that is hard to edit and is buried in submissions and missubmissions.

Thanks for the quick response.
Just to remind that today is already Friday, April 30 and the number of links did not change on April 27.
Well, if the category is a mess, why not to have more people to clean it up, so submissions like mine will not be lost 2 times already.

Thanks
Alex

Some categories are just not suitable for new editors, there is no point bringing in someone to look at a mess, and make more of a mess out of it.

A new editor has to start with something managaeble, and prove they can deal with something small - and many cannot. At least way it limits the level of damage.

Existing editors with experience are recruited to go and clean up large categories that have got out of control.

There is a lag between the time edits are made on the edit side and they become visible on the public side. A week to ten days is about average.

Well, if the category is a mess, why not to have more people to clean it up, so submissions like mine will not be lost 2 times already.

Click to expand...

So we should put someone who does not know what they are doing in a category in the hopes that with enough serindipity and pixie dust, everything will turn out all right? No thanks. We only allow editors to edit where they are qualified, because the impact of poor editing is much worse than the impact of unreviewed submissions getting covered in dust. After all, we make no commitment as to how long it will take us to review submissions, and certainly submissions are not viewed as necessary to the building of a directory.

There are more than 450,000 categories and fewer than 10,000 active editors. If you do the math you can see why a given category not getting touched for a month is not unrealistic.

Also, it is a common occurance for an editor to work in a category and for the number of links not to change. An editor who goes into a spam-nest with 200 waiting submissions, and cleans out 125 non-eligible, spam-spew, affilliate hives has performed a tremendous service to the directory. You just can't see it.

Getting listed is not a source of instantaneous gratification, it is an effort where you need to be prepared for the long haul. While it may be an eternity to you, four months in DMOZ time is nothing.

Good point, I'm doing a cleanup in a messed up category in Business. [one we would never give to new editors] I've spend a lot of time in there, I've deleted at least 50 in the unreviewed that don't belong there, sent a lot off to other categories, flagged several for further work, and finally got around to listing three new ones. So anyone looking from the outside would not have seen too many changes happening.

If you can include 2 of your competitors with just as good as description as your site on your new editor application then you are a good candidate for editor. Whether or not you list them is another story. The editalls that follow up on you will be more than happy to list them and it tends to be alot quicker than submitting. We tend to watch new editors. We love to list new sites. Sometimes alls it takes is to find a timed out new editor that added only there own site or there affiliate sites for a detailed reviewed of the category adding all sites that are pertintent. Think twice before applying to the ODP to list just your own site. New editors are watched. Trust me.

spectregunner said:

We only allow editors to edit where they are qualified, because the impact of poor editing is much worse than the impact of unreviewed submissions getting covered in dust. .

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Dear spectregunner,
What makes you think that my, for example, qualifications are insufficient? (sounds insulting, quite frankly). Nobody asked me for resume. There is no even option to apply.

Understand all the issues around "waiting". What I do not understand, based on what I read in this forum, is how I can be sure that my submission is WAITING and not LOST which has happened, sorry for repeating, twice already.

Thanks

>>The size of the category makes it unlikely a new editor would be allowed to jump in and edit there.

>There is no even option to apply.

>What makes you think that my, for example, qualifications are insufficient? (sounds insulting, quite frankly).

Let's see. The qualifications for that category are (1) some interest in Market Research, and (2) experience in editing a directory category of at least 100-150 links, and (3) experience involving approximately 100-150 edits in the Open Directory.

You have been accused neither of ignorance, idiocy, immorality, nor any other kind of incapacity. But it would take a colossal degree of arrogance to find insult in a statement like "the relevant qualification is a kind of experience you don't have."

Alex:

Your skin is too thin and you are looking for insults where none were proffered.

We are talking about http://www.dmoz.org/Business/Marketing_and_Advertising/Market_Research/

I have more than 9,000 ODP edits to my credit, and while I edit in a lot of categories, including some in Business/ I am not qualified to edit there because:

I have never applied to edit there.
I have never met the requirement for an editor to edit there (submitting three URLs, with qualified titles and descriptions) and while I have more that 25 years of experience in high technology mass communciations, I ahve not demonstrated to the satisfaction of the meta editors that I can properly judge the sites.

Could I quality? Most likely, if I applied.
Could you qualify? Possibly, but not today, tomorrow or the next day, because you do not have enough qualified ODP edits to be eligible for consideration in that category.

The fact is that we don't allow unqualified editors to edit. Qualifications are more than a piece of paper and years fo experience, qualifications are quality editing experience in ODP, learning the ropes, understanding how to use the dash board and the plethora of editor tools, gaining the judgement and experience necessary to get further permissions. When I joined ODP I thought a mirror was something that hung on the wall. I'd never heard of a fraternal mirror. Guys like Hutcheson have so many edits under their belt that they can smell a bad site before clicking in it. ODP is wonderful, everyone starts at the bottom and earns their way up, and until you have worked in the trenches and demonstrated your core ability, you/me/editor x are not qualified to edit categories with more than a handful of sites. And as a result, the people like me, who are simply editors, have a tremendous respect for the editalls and metas because we know how hard they had to work to get there, and when we talk about not being qualified to undertake some tasks, we are painfully aware that we are talking about ourselves.

I am sorry that you saw an insult in:

We only allow editors to edit where they are qualified,

but yes, "qualified" in that context has less to do with how much you know about your subject area, and more to do with how much prior editing experience you have in other ODP categories.

Only someone with some prior experience of dealing with spam, mirrors, duplicates, and so on, and a proven ability of accurately describing sites, would be granted a category such as that, where those sort of unlistable submissions are the majority of what is there.

Heck, after three years editing in quieter parts of the directory, I still wouldn't even feel like applying to edit that lot.

First time I submitted a link to the category about 4 months ago. Checked the status after a month – no track of the submission.
Editor:
“I have checked the category you mention and every subcategories and cannot find this suggestion. Nor can I find evidence of an editor having ever reviewed it.”

Resubmitted at the end of February, checked status after a moth…
Editor:
“I see no submission for this URL in that category, nor any record of it being moved or reviewed… please resubmit”.
Well I did. All 3 times got “Submission Received” massage. Based on the previous results the chances to see it are, probably, very remote.

Click to expand...

This to me sounds like a technical problem somewhere. You are submitting and get the submission received message, but editors don't see the site in the pool waiting. If you have been getting status from a particular editor in the thread you have been using, why don't you try PMing them for assistance in at least getting your site in the pool of sites waiting for review.