DMOZ Isn't Open

[damarzee]

One of my domains, http://www.designingonline.com had a listing in DMOZ, (you can still see a link to it's position in the Google list of linked sites), then one day i noticed it was gone. I submitted several times over the past year and received no reply, nor has the site been added again.

The frustrating part is that there is no way to know why a change has occured and there is no way to counter what was done.

just today, I started using a thumbnail image site to add website thumbnails to certain links, but they use the DMOZ as a base and more than half of the legitimate sites I work with, aren't listed.

Those within DMOZ who do perform wonderfully are being poorly overshadowed because of many others who have let their own interests interfere with the job they freely accepted to do, but are doing more damage than good.

I agree, DMOZ is not OPEN. It can be slanted and very unclear. If there is a governing set of rules for editors, a better way is needed to see that they are adherred to.

Finally and meanwhile, I would rather that other search engines and businesses would stop using DMOZ as their base for listing sites. In that effect, one sour or tired editor could cause a website to virtually disappear from many seach engines. That's alot of power for an individual to be handed...without having anyone to answer to and without having to provide explanation of any kind...perhaps it's time for a revolution.

[ofoglada]

I've attempted to be an editor several times. I can say as an editor that the rest of the "Community" is as harsh as a bath in barbwire. Not a single submission i made was not hammered to hell and back. I found that it was a big Egotist race to who can be the best DMOZ editor. Well being im not getting paid to deal with other peoples crap i left dmoz.

My most irritating moment was when they would not approve www.franchising.com into the directory because it was in affiliation with www.franchise-update.com. Now Franchising.com is a Franchisee focused site aimed at people looking to get into franchising. Franchise UPDATE on the other hand is a trade magazine that has been disributed for over 20 years and is aimed at Franchisors, IE. The owner of Yum Brands Food Chains. While both covered entirely different spectrums of the franchising industry it was refused. To me this is saying that PC Magazine cant be listed because Playstation Magazine is already in there. And being They are tied together by Ziff Davis only 1 can be listed.

So to make a story short. I havent had 1 single good experience with DMOZ.

B.Foley

[peakstudios]

The DMOZ is run by the people who won't add sites to the listings that help them; so in general the DMOZ is a hoax and shouldn't be recognized as a open directory. Which brings me to my bigger question, are they giving us false information in their policies? from my experience their policies were instituted just like or constitution. Great ideas to give equality to all. unfortunatly for the DMOZ their policies are not inforced nor are they recognized by most editors of the DMOZ. You could even question if their name alone is false advertisment "open directory", that's a laugh.

[acornwebworks]

I applied to become a DMOZ editor in my area of expertise.

Many of the included sites in my area didn't even exist anymore. Some listings were obviously not appropriate for a directory. The directory was organized poorly. And many of the top sites in the field were not included. (I worded my application far nicer than that :-)

I read all the requirements and studied the forum. I wrote succinct yet compelling descriptions for 3 sites (is that the # for the application? I forget) that are among the leaders in the field. I tried to convince the powers-that-be that I was not only an expert in my field, but that I love my field and wanted to make 'my' portion of the directory as useful to searchers as was humanly possible.

In less than 24 hours I was rejected as not having met their high standards...whatever those standards were.

They still don't have an editor. I guess nothing is better than something.

[hopeman]

I have try for year get sites into dmoz.
WE have no problems any other places
DMOZ always declined or listings and for no good reason.
It very easy see the editors are favoring there own sites.
DMOZ IS TOTAL UNFAIR!

[lonewolf56]

DMOZ is a travesty. I have some very high profile sites that do terrific business as well as provide lots of information about specific topics. I've now had THREE sites rejected simply because either the "editor" deemed our domain name too advantageous (not mine, but think Cars.com or CreditCard.com) or the "editor" owned a site in the same category we applied for and simply blocked us.[/img]

[mkinzie1]

I tried for quite some time to get one of our sites listed on DMOZ. Finally, I got tired of waiting and became the editor for the category we were trying to get listed in. I remained an editor for awhile, but finally dropped out when time became a factor.

From my experience with DMOZ, it has a wide range of personalities as editors. Most of the ones I worked with were serious about their work, were very helpful, and generally good people to work with. On the other hand, well, let's just say it takes all kinds.

Now we have several sites we have been trying to get listed on DMOZ again, but it's not happening. Anyone want to volunteer to be an editor?

[munki]

DMOZ is a nonsense. As a directory it is useless and badly structured, as a search tool it is bug-ridden and ineffective. One of my sites has been waiting 17 months for review, another 6 months. Many of the sites that are actually in there are appalling, both in content and in presentation. I have no interest in having my sites in the directory, it's simply the link from the associated PR6/7 pages that I want. I have no idea what the editors actually do, but whatever it is it clearly isn't reviewing sites.

[cbp]

Here we go again - typical DMOZ bashing.

CRich - you need to first go to DMOZ and understand what the OPEN in Open Direcory Project actually means - bad title for article and bad journalism to misrepresent the "Open" - it has nothing to do with being open to accept listing, submissions etc

CRich wrote:

How long should someone have to wait before they are approved, denied, or contacted about either?

This is based on the typical misuderstanding that DMOZ is some sort of listing service for webmasters. It is not.

Processing submissions is only a small part of the job of a DMOZ editor - its is the most inefficient and time wasting way an editor has to build category. I usualy prefer to initially ignore the submitted sites when I go in to work on a category. The sooner DMOZ turns off the <submit a site> function the better.

mawells wrote:

Oh, I make the attempt to submit from time-to-time, but usually the categories I need to submit to don't have editors at all!

Where do peple get this stuff from? Every category has over 200 editors that can edit in it !!!!

I've tried over a dozen times to get one of my client's sites moved to a more appropriate category or even get the description corrected with no success. (Again, no editor for that category.)

Having no editor has nothing to do with it. Maybe the reason is not good enough for a move. Have you done the right think and checked for the reason at the DMOZ forum for it not being moved? Why come and bash DMOZ here - you are doing your client a diservice by spamming DMOZ with over a dozen requests.

PDemester

submitted under a heading only to learn 3 months later that the #3 player in my market was the editor

If you think that you have been disadvantaged by the editor being what you think is a competitor, there are polices and procedures in place to deal with this. What did they say when you went through these proper chanals? .... or are you just bashing DMOZ without having done this?

After several months - I tried submitting the site again.

I submitted another site we had - under the same categories

Thats called spam... you are putting yourself at a disadvantage.

peter(IMC)

The whole goal of dmoz was never reached.

I don't quite follow the logic here... your site is not listed and the goal of DMOZ was never reached.

The goal of DMOZ is being reached, its just your service expectations are not being met. DMOZ is not there to service webmasters.

What increase in value is there to DMOZ to list your SEO site? There are alredy a 1000 listed .... what is the point in having 1001 - the editor is better of going to other categories.

find sites with multiple listings

....and the problem with that is?

Dmoz is the perfect example of why human intervention without any control doesn't work.

Huh? But, DMOZ is a human edited directory. If you wat automation, go to Google. Why would DMOZ want to automate? - we already have plenty of them

brian mcdonald

i contact dmoz and was told there was nothing i could do to "prove" copyright infringement and as such there was no chance they would remove the offending site from their director

Which is right. How is DMOZ supposed to know which is the copy? Your competitor could be saying the same thing about you. I am sure the site will get dumped if there is some sort of legal proof. You need to pursue other avenues re the copyright and not blame DMOZ.

peakstudios

went to that board asnd was told I was accepted over a year ago. I still haveen't been placed into the directory.

What were you told? Your site has not yet been "acecpted" ... you have been keeping the editors busy with all your spam duplicate submissions (if you are talking about the site in your signature).

applied to become an editor since the editor wasn't doing thier job. I was rejected by the editor of that area.

Not true.

found it strange that the same person that's not doing the job imediatly rejected me

Absolute rubbish. That editor would have had nothing to do with it.

yellek228

I was told that they received my submission and I am not to inquire again for 6 months. Now, if these editors are so busy that it will take 8 months to get one site reviewed

I am getting a little tired of repling to factual errors - again is is just plain wrong.
Who said it will take another 6 months to get listed? Please get your facts right. You were told you can ask again in 6 months about the status if you were not listed - that has absolutly notng to do with when you wil get listed. If editors did not tell those over at resource zone to check back in 6 months, they will be spending all there time responding to status submission requests.

Any company who canaccept you but doesn't post you because of competion, shady practices

What was the response that you got from the DMOZ abuse reporting process to you complaint?

miss_beth

told me that I'd been denied because my site was too much like so many others and not to waste time resubmitting

Which is correct. DMOZ is not a free listing service. DMOZ is trying to build categories of valuable rsources. What is the point in listing serveral sites in the same category that have pretty much the same content or offer pretty much the same product. What is the value to the DMOZ user?

but if someone doesn't have the time or desire to do the job, then why do they volunteer or continue to keep the volunteer position?

So we come back to this one again ... if I volunteer at a soup kitchen one day a month, am I being lazy if I do not do 2 days a months. Is a volunteer editor being lazy if hey only add one site a month instead of 2? - they still have added value to the directory.

damarzee
Your site is not was removd and will not listed as it is just a collection of links - has no content of its own.

peakstudios

are they giving us false information in their policies?

Back again for more. What false infrmation? You are the one above not being truthful.

Also you need to go and look up what the "open" in Open Directory Project means - get YOUR facts right.
_________________________________________________

Is not anyone getting tired to of DMOZ bashng? - espcially when its based on so many factual errors that have come out in this thread and none of tskis actually constructive.

Anyone also notice that it is only webmasters that whinge about DMOZ? I have never ever seen a single complaint from a DMOZ user.

To sum up:
1) Webmasters want a free listing from volunteer editors
2) DMOZ wants to build categories of valuable resources for the DMOZ user

These two are not compatible.

At the end of the day:
DMOZ is the largest direcory and no other directory comes close (almost 4.5 million sites)
DMOZ is the fastest growing directory and no ther directory comes close (2000 sites a day).

It is also free ... if you are unhapy about the service you get try asking for a refund.

CBP

[Starlifter]

I've been trying (irregularly) for over a year to get two totally different sites listed (one a collector's site the other my business). Totally different categories, one very specialised and the other quite competitive. Both categories have editors but no success with either, or even the courtesy of a rejection. Just nothing.
Total waste of space, just frustrating that quite a few other (mainly minor) search engines do seem to concentrate on their results.