ODP Site Backlog

Why are you waiting so Long?

[coosblues]

I just wanted to make a general comment. I acquired a new ODP category today and found nearly 400 sites waiting to be reviewed. I have read many posts from irritated webmasters that are upset with their site submissions. You need to remember that your site getting listed depends on quite a number of variables. First, and foremost is the dire lack of qualified editors - Secondly, we have to deal with a great amount of spam - Thridly - we must visit each site in great detail. We cannot just visit the homepage and say OK, all is well and add your sites. We must visit each page, which on a large site can take hours. Also, it depends where your site sits in the que. Submitting your site over and over again just drops you to the end of the que. In theory, your site could have been next in line for the editor to review, but if you made another submission then you drop back to the very end, and the process starts all over again. Also, just because you submit your site and it is reviewed is not a guarantee it will be listed. I'd like to suggest to anyone that has the time to submit to become an editor. Many of the smaller categorys need editors, and those categorys are an excellent starting point for you to learn. I've been editing for just 2 years now and I'm still learning. I understand your frustrations, but rather than complain become a part of the solution. If you'd like to sticky me with questions I'll try to answer them, but I too have websites to maintain and a daily job. There is also the resource zone where you can ask questions about your sites status, and most likely you'll at least get some kind of answer. It may not be the one you want, but believe me the people at the ODP are working hard to get your sites included if they meet the standards.

Scott

[bull]

We must visit each page

They should do so, but most editors don't. I have a bilingual subdirectory listed in 4 cats (2x regional, 2x topic), and each time it was added to a new cat, the editor in charge visited max. 15 of these 400 pages.

[coosblues]

ok, lets say "should" but that's an impossible task considering sites with 1000's of pages.

[windharp]

Well, visiting 15 pages is quite ome work, too. Even with my fast connection it would take me some minutes to look at them. When reviewing a directory, I would not visit each and every page, too. Look at a few examples and assume that the rest of the page is the same is the way to go there.

The "view the whole site" statement is more about "normal" sites that have different content on every single page. If one can assume that the content is somehow similiar on the rest of the pages, and there will be nothing new to find - it would be useless to carry on.

[AthlonInside]

Good and Bad are sole decision of the editor. That's why it is quite unlucky if we encounter some irresponsible editor, who approved a simple less than 10 pages site but ignore a content site.

[flicker]

It really depends on the kind of site, too. Sometimes it is apparent from the very first page that the site doesn't meet ODP guidelines (it's a mirror of an already-listed site, for example). Other times there's good enough content on the very first page to merit a listing. Sometimes we're just browsing through the rest of the site to see if there are any pages worthy of a deeplink, or maybe we're just interested in the site or have decided to go shopping. (Don't laugh, I've bought things from sites I was reviewing before!) You can't tell much from your site log, I'm afraid.

Anyway, if your site doesn't have unique content on the main page, your odds of a listing do diminish. No one has time to look through all 8000 of your product pages to see if one of them might be unique. If your site carries a lot of affiliate sales but also unique products, you may have a better chance at the unique products being noticed (by editors OR by surfing shoppers bored of the same-old affiliate things) if you call attention to them on your homepage. And if your main page is nothing but affiliate sales but you do have a unique subpage about the history of the submarine, or something else unrelated that we're not likely to notice from the homepage, that's the one time I would recommend actually submitting the deeplink itself to the ODP (INSTEAD of the main page you know we don't want).

I occasionally explore most or all of a site, especially if it has a good sitemap and a lot of informational content, but realistically, if your best pages are buried where they're hard to find, editors and surfers alike may miss them.

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Disclaimer: This post constitutes an unofficial, personal opinion not necessarily shared by other ODP editors, the university, or my cats.

[orlady]

Don't laugh, I've bought things from sites I was reviewing before!

LOL, flicker! I can't help laughing, because I recognize myself in your comment. I don't know if I've bought anything from a site I was reviewing, but I've become a regular visitor to some sites that I first visited as an editor. :)

[BillytheKid]

Me too. I end up buying from sites I visit all of the time. :)

[creative craig]

I occasionally explore most or all of a site, especially if it has a good sitemap and a lot of informational content..

I too look for a site map when I hit the home page, I then normaly have to trail the site when there isn't one :(

Craig

[rfgdxm1]

>Well, visiting 15 pages is quite ome work, too. Even with my fast connection it would take me some minutes to look at them. When reviewing a directory, I would not visit each and every page, too. Look at a few examples and assume that the rest of the page is the same is the way to go there.

>The "view the whole site" statement is more about "normal" sites that have different content on every single page. If one can assume that the content is somehow similiar on the rest of the pages, and there will be nothing new to find - it would be useless to carry on.

Hmm...you are on high speed? I'm on dial up. If a site has hundred of pages, or worse yet thousands, as an ODP editor basically it would be impossible to check every last page on the site. If I must view every page, this would mean that with any largish, content rich site that was submitted, I'd have no choice but to just leave it in unreviewed for some other editor to review. And just review only the relatively small sites where I could look at every page. Doesn't the ODP have something like over a million sites in unreviewed? I'm not sure that it would be the greatest of policies that small sites with minimally adequate content get the fast track, while the large, authoratative ones get tossed on the back burner for some meta or editall to get around to it when they can.

Worse yet, if I do leave a large, authoratative site in unreviewed with an editor's note it is to large for me to review, there is no way for a meta, editall or editor of a top level cat to know this. It is just one of the many, many sites in unreviewed. If that cat has few unrevieweds, they likely would just assume all is OK, and focus on the cats with a huge heap of unrevieweds. The only way metas or editalls could know I couldn't look at every page is if one contacted me to personally notify them every time I encountered a site which was too large to check every page. I'm not so sure that any meta or editall has so little to do they'd want me to personally contact them in every such case. ;)

As for the issue of whether the site has above the threshold of minimum unique content, no need to check every page. After seeing enough pages to meet that threshold, this would be adequate. The only reason to look at every page would be to make sure that the site wasn't a scam, where most of the content wasn't evident from what the home page made it appear. However, a random sampling of pages should be enough to check for that. If every page randomly checked was on topic and relevant, this should be adequate.

Should I be in error here, I encourage any meta to correct me. I assume reasonable editorial discretion is such that I can be confident that a submitted site isn't some porn site trying to get a listing in an inappropriate cat and slide under the radar, this is adequate. Statistical sampling is scientifically reasonable.

[IITian]

Me too. I end up buying from sites I visit all of the time. :)

I thought DMOZ editors could get them for free if they asked the site owners. ;)

[Powdork]

As an editor for Joe Ant we have to at least check several things just because of the way things are required to be done. We must check to see if it is e-commerce (which means following that link to make sure it doesn't just say "please print this form and fax it to 867-5309"), we must determine if their are downloads available, video, etc. Much of this requires more than a cursory look at a site, not just to determine listability, but to make sure we give the user as much info as is reasonably possible.

Is <snip-zone> down? I haven't been able to reach it today.

[bull]

Re: snip-zone. Unreachable for about 14 hours now from here (Germany)

[BillytheKid]

I believe it is a DNS propagation issue. It will be back soon. Hang in there. :)

[flicker]

By the way...

>I thought DMOZ editors could get them for free if they asked the site owners. ;)

I do see the smiley (-:, but I think I'd better clarify for the lurkers: *please* don't try to bribe ODP editors with free merchandise or anything else. We have to report it, it's a pain, and it can actually get you banned even if your site is good. Which isn't what any of us want. In fact, it's a good idea not to make jokes about paying editors when asking the ODP about your site, because as with touchy airport personnel and bomb jokes, you could find yourself taken more seriously than you meant.

I now return you to your regularly scheduled discussion. (-:

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Disclaimer: This post constitutes an unofficial, personal opinion not necessarily shared by other ODP editors, the university, or my cats.

[podman]

Ethical editors will often attach notes to sites where owners have "joked" about bribes. It's taken very seriously.

[IITian]

... but I think I'd better clarify for the lurkers: *please* don't try to bribe ODP editors with free merchandise or anything else.

I think I too should clarify my previous statement. I meant that as a joke as reaction to what some people are spreading rumors about DMOZ. I hope nobody was offended.

In reality, based on my short experience as a low-level editor, I have to say that many of the editors (metas) seem to put in full-time hours volunteering for DMOZ and are very helpful.

[flicker]

I'm not at all offended; I just wanted to make sure nobody following along at home missed the smiley and thought it might be a good strategy to try. (-: