There are 100's of other good directories - we have a long thread here at WPW that lists most of them. Some of them are a free listing service, most follow a different "business" model to DMOZ. To get a DMOZ listing is not that important, IMHO (ohers must disgree or we would not have this thread)

I think you might have missed kricptons post:Most sites get listed well within a "year or two" - ~2000 get listed every day (what other directory does that?). I think I even listed one site in a matter of seconds (the submission arrived as I when between pages --- so I listed it!!!).

CBP

There are plenty of controls in place internally to deal with this. Are you familair with them?

There is nothing wrong with an editor listing their own site, providing it is done explicitly and within the guidelines.

I certainly listed my own site and as I said in a previous message, I also listed all my "competitor's" sites (they were not even submitted!!!).... the only advantage I go is that my site was listed for a whole day longer than my competitors :-(

The sites that I am associated with are all declared internally at DMOZ. I am not an employee of WPW or any associated companies...I am not even in the same country, but am just a voluntary mod here --- I even declared WPW on my list of affiliated sites inernally at DMOZ with a description of my involvement to keep it "above board".

Most editors are above board.

Don't jump to conclusions that all editors have sites - I know several DMOZ editors personaly - many are teachers, doctors etc, have no sites of their own, have no idea about Google rankings - they just have an interest and some knowledge in the area

CBP

Jim no hostility here to WPW as a whole... my posting style, ethics, and words of wisdom are clearly evident and seen in others each time I come back... I greatly assisted in creating WPW into what it is because I was out-spoken.

The motive of the news article and this thread concerns me greatly though... these are not demonstrations of professional conduct, not in forum etiquette and certainly not in professional reporting.

IMHO there is but one other web forum at the caliber of WPW - that's WebmasterWorld - and I believe both must strive to be leaders in knowledge sharing and allow other less credible venues to tolerate sensationalizing just to score points.

I doubt much thought was given to professional conduct in writing the WPN article and thread starter... well at least from an iEntry perspective.

The bias twist and sensationalism did what it was meant to do... invoke a response from newsletter readers and possibly get them to the forum to post. It caught my attention as well... and no where did I read an attempt to get official comments from DMOZ management... now let's twist this a bit more...

If WPW did a bias newsworthy segment "article and thread" centered around your organization and without getting your position in advance... and you learn of this "after-the-fact" once 4 million readers saw how corrupt your organization was (whether true or untrue) you would thoroughly enjoy that - correct?

Lots of good solid exposure - for a good cause!

It NEWS right!

I read WPW tag line as:

The World Forum for eBusiness Professionals

Join hundreds of eBusiness experts and your peers to exchange information, advice, tips and strategies on technology and business.

NOT

The World Forum for eBusiness Professionals

Join hundreds of eBusiness experts and your peers to share infromation of unsupported claims, half truths, one-sided reporting.

As a previous "editor" for three different cats at Dmoz, I was quite shocked at the latest WebProWorld newsletter that arrived in my email box!

All the editors are *volunteers*; during the 18 months in which I donated some of my very limited "spare time", I - like the other volunteers - undertook a very thorough assessment of each website submitted, in order to evaluate its "quality" and the potential contribution the site might make to the global information landscape.

In a number of instances, there were times when submitted URLs were unreachable; these were not automatically deleted from the submissions list, merely shuffled down the list for accessing at a later time.

In other instances, the submission could only be described as complete crap. With the mission of the Open Directory Project clearly stating that the object was to provide links to quality material ...

Biblia, the Warrior Librarian
Warrior Librarian

It appears that being in DMOZ helps on Google only if you are listed high in the directory, which will cause Google to view you as an expert. A regional listing has some value, but not much.

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I was prompted to come here for the first time by an email - must have been the same one - as a DMOZ editall the title seemed irresistable. Glad to see cbp doing a fantastic job in defense.

Editors do abuse their position in DMOZ - or there would be no need for an abuse procedure. All editors are encouraged to be vigilent and report abuse and so can anyone else. Where allegations are proven the editor is fired. If you have a complaint about an editor's actions report them, don't whine about them where nothing can be done. I am a webmaster and have listed my own sites. After listing dozens of direct competitors at the same time. It isn't done deceptively - we declare our affiliations. All editors can list their own sites if they have the rights and the site meets the same standards as everyone elses - it seems a fair exchange to me for hundreds if not thousands of hours of unpaid work on behalf of the end users.

We seem to hear a lot of complaints about how long sites take to be listed. But no-one ever comes to forums like this to say their site was listed in a day, or a week, or a couple of weeks. As many sites are listed within hours or days of submission as are hanging about for months and years. It all depends on the category, how much spam is in the way, how easy the site is to list - it is properly titled and described and do the title and description actually match the site, for instance. When you consider the sheer scale of the submissions received these complaints are few and far between by comparison. Four million sites listed? Not bad considering it is entirely the work of volunteers using their spare time.

When it comes to editor applications, and receiving no reply there was a bug a while back. There is nothing to stop anyone trying again - some editors have taken several attempts to get in. But if your primary aim is to list your site then run, forget it.

Like many others a large proportion of my work these days is running through categories clearing out junk, spam, and duplicate submissions. People submit their site a dozen times wasting an editors time that could have been spent listing the first one. As far as I'm concerned that puts them in the low priority bracket and others will get looked at first - fair's fair, if the others follow the rules and submit once, why should they be penalized because some idiot wastes an editor's time.

Yep, we're different. We're unique and there is no point in having yet another pay directory. We're also free - what do you want for nothing!

Keep up the good work cbp :-)

I submitted my site to DMOZ last year and am still not "in there." In fact, I just tried to check again and it came back with "check your search in..." and it listed all the major search engines. Guess what? My site is in all of them, so what's the benefit of getting into DMOZ? I don't understand. Should I worry about this? Thanks.

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DMOZ - biggest joke on this earth. I was an editor for them at one time myself. They removed my editing rights because I was inactive for awhile. I wrote them and explained that there was a death in the family and a serious heart attack to boot. Alot of things went undone during this time period. Never even got an email back from them after several attempts.

I also have been trying to get one of our sites listed with them and it has now been almost 2-1/2 years. During the first year I was resubmitting the site until I realized this just moves you back to the bottom of the pile. So I left it alone. Everytime I checked on status, I was told it was waiting. The next time I would check it was somehow deleted, so I would resubmit and send it back to the bottom. It has been almost another year - still not listed and editors are awful snotty when you try to check status.

What a big joke. They definitely need to change their system.

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I'm so thrilled to see this topic! As a web developer/marketer it is my responsibility to get my clients listed in DMOZ. DMOZ has done nothing short of deny my clients' rights to be listed in the directory. Client after client is left with months of no response and therefore no listing. It is time for DMOZ to pull the plug. There are very very very few editors remaining with any of the altruistic motives with which DMOZ was originally created. www.villagetraditions.com, www.orsracksdirect.com. www.pennwaste.com, www.pranastudio.com, www.worldcupsupply.com ...and on and on. I dutifully resubmit every 5 weeks or so with no response whatsoever. I am an editor at skaffe.com and get back to questions within 48 hours, there is no excuse for this negligence. Virtually all editors at DMOZ are in it for their own personal website rewards...don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

Don't be such a fool trying to twist my words. I didn't say that dmoz doesn't reach its goals because my site wasn't listed.

If a directory is full (that´s what you´re saying) then the editors should simply say that it is full and not come up with some lame excuse.

In this page: http://www.dmoz.org/add.html

it says: "submitting the same URL more than once is not permitted" however, there are many sites with multiple listings. Obviously something is wrong here. (tip of the iceberg?)

Doesn't anybody at dmoz realise their directory is always about a year behind schedule? In other words,. if a user searches for something, he won't find anything that is newer than a year. Great service people!


Oh well, I don't see the purpose of even trying to submit to dmoz. If you want to give it a shot, go ahead, but it´s obvious that you´re totally at the mercy of the editors.[/quote]

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There are 1000's of sites with mutiple DMOZ listngs. What is wrong with that? It is within the guidelines. Editors will list a site in more than one category if they think the quality of the content is worth it.

Why is there no point? It only takes a matter of minutes to do so. It costs nothing. Submit and forget. Yes you are at the mercy of an editor - its a human edited directory!!! If yo do not want to be at the mercy of a human editor, go to another directory. If you have a really good site thats adds value to the category and are lucky, it may get listed even if you do not submit. I list more sites from searching google than from the pool of submitted sites

ewhitaker
I don't quite follow your logic either. How is it a big joke if your site is not listed? Surely it can't be the biggest joke on this earth - I know some really funny jokes - would you like to hear them?

If they were undone, maybe they weren't done right (ie guideline compliant) in the first place? Maybe when you reapplied, your previus edits were checked?Maybe that is why you never got reinstated or never heard back? (I have no inside info on this one)

When will the DMOZ whingers have some constructive to say?

CBP

A third or so the sites I have listed were never submitted - don't recall any of them saying thank you as they never had to wait.

They all added real value to the category.

CBP

qoute:

"Its is obvious from your post, that your whinge is based on you not understanding DMOZ and DMOZ not meeting YOUR service expectations - in that case, I suggest to request arefund .... oh, hang on a minute, its free!!! "

why don't you explain to them what thir not understing?

Just remember you said it was free!

qoute from DMOZ:

http://dmoz.org/about.html
"The Open Directory was founded in the spirit of the Open Source movement, and is the only major directory that is 100% free."

Here's what their about.

Remeber they said it TOO.

quote:

"Obviously you are looking for a free listing service from DMOZ. As
DMOZ does not provide this service, can I suggest you go elsewhere."

Then why does DMOZ and you say it's free?

Oh yeah you just contradicted yourself and the DMOZ.

Quote:

"Other direcories have a free and paid listing service. An editors job is not to review sites. An editors job is to build a category of resources ..."

Don't you think we submit our sites to help the editors? If the category isn't the I request for it and ask to help, but nothing is ever done.

I know their are some spammers out their, but they put them at the end of the line every time they resubmit. So how come the editors aren't putting us in for years?

we should be moving up in line when we wait so long, and the spammers always stay at the back. Was I spamming when I waited 6 months and asked about my site?

If you waited six months for a response and asked again you wouldn't be spamming, you would be courious and caring about what is going on. Also many people here have tried to help and been rejected.

qoute:

"Why are you bothering to monitor it. The standard advice is submit and forget ... move on."

I can notice it on goolge search.
do a dmoz search on anything you want. find a web site. Now type in that company name at google. In the top of google's first page(Not always, but more often than not). You can also type in the directory name, at google if they have any SEO they will be on the top of those pages too.

So when you know that don't ya think we should care. I know I care about what I'm doing. And it sounds to me almost everyone else here does too, or else they wouldn't be so worried about this.

how many people our editors at DMOZ and also work in the SEO world?

Quote:

"Maybe because we have to deal with so many who expect something for nothing and have a major misuderstanding about what DMOZ is about."

I thought it was free and I aslo tried to help, but it's not open.

Why don't u explain what the DMOZ is about rather than skiping over it. what is this "...major misunderstanding..." we have?

Quote:

"I don't see you coming here correcting factual errors. Have you counted how many not true statements have been posted in this thread."

By who?

Qoute:

"You are showing your misunderstadings. DMOZ (like any other "business") does listen to its users ("customers") ... webmasters trying to get a listing are just not the user/customer. The users of DMOZ data are the user/customer."

Customer = Google, and other search engines using their database.

How can sites for example like carpet cleaning companies, Archetecture firms, Reastraunts in local areas and other sites like this haven't been listed?

and don't blame it on developers, because we submit it, we are doing it for are client who might not be very web savy or just doesn't want to do it. When you see the same person registering more than 1 site maybe it's because they have made more than 1 web site each for a different company. I only submit a site when it's finished (or shall I say at completion of version 1.0).

Submitit and forget it!

I think they mean if you submit it then forget it!
Because we all know if you submit it nothing ever happens.

Okay, lets try and address your misunderstandings, but this is getting tiresome...
I did not contradict myself, but probably should have made myself clearer - by free listing service, I mean the mentality that exists that DMOZ should list every site submitted, that it somehow owes webmasters something. I should have left the word free out - and said something like DMOZ is not a listing service there for the benefit of webmasters - other directories provide that service for free and paid.

Yes you do and we know that, but the pool of submited sites is just one of many resources an editor can use to build a category. The point I have made several times is that it is the worst source and an inefficient use of the limited time a volunteer editor has.

kricpton answered that with the reasons above - there is already to much repitition in this thread.

I have no idea, but of the editors I know none are SEO's. I assume there are some.

There are about ~4000 sites using DMOZ data (not just search engines - none of them are complaining!!

Have you read the thead - I have done that several times....

I guess you have not read the thread - if you have, you will see all the factual errors being corrected!!!

Another factual error. ~2000 sites a day get listed. Thats nothing ever happening?? ... that makes DMOZ the fastest growing directory out there - nothing else comes close to this number.

CBP

I submitted to DMOZ each of my 3 sites, starting about 2 years ago. After about 6 months, I sent an email to the editors at DMOZ, no reply. Of course there are other similar sites to mine already listed in DMOZ. I dont know why they got listed. I keep my expectations low for ever getting listed into DMOZ.

Editors are encouraged not to reply to emails.

The site in your profile has been not been accepted for a listing.

CBP

I'll just point out two things about your post.

1. You (nor your clients) have any right to have their site listed on DMOZ.

2. Resubmitting your sites is about 180 degrees from what you should be doing.

I'll be the first to admit that DMOZ has its issues. Being seemingly slower than molasses is one of them; it appears to be one of the drawbacks from attempting a directory of this size.

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