Forum Moderators: open
This really belongs to the internal ODP forums, but anyway:
The general ODP policy is not to care about techniques that might influence the search engines. If the site offers unique content, then it should get a listing in the relevant category, independently of the quality of the HTML in terms of SEO.
It is a fine line we tread. Most pages that are "stuffed" have poor content anyway. It is spam. If I came across a site that was rich in relevant content, but also was stuffed, I wouldn't be bothered about emailing Google to report it. I would think about it's inclusion in DMOZ long and hard. I may even write to the webmaster asking them to remove the spam. However, I imagine that this senario would be a rare case, and most times the page would be worthless and the URL would be deleted.
I believe that a function of DMOZ is to provide quality sites for users. If a user searches a stuffed page for a particular word, and then wonders why it is invisible and what it was doing listed in DMOZ, it undermines the credibility of the directory. I wouldn't worry much about most other SEO techniques, but when it comes to spam, its out!
This subject could be (has been/ should be/ will be) argued over in the DMOZ forum. I am not on a personal crusade against stuffing, but whenever I come across non-relevant and stuffed pages, I may feel the need to do something about it, either as a punter in search engines such as Google, or as a DMOZ editor.
(edited by: electro at 4:44 pm (utc) on Feb. 21, 2002)
I was under impression that DMOZ was to provide users unique content accessible in a majority of browsers. I don't think it is stated anywhere in DMOZ mission statement to tell webmasters how to build their sites. This is another reason to look negatively at DMOZ.
Don't get me wrong, I don't advocate spam or use of invisible hardly visible spamming text. But I must admit, that as a heavy CSS user this whole issue makes me a little nervous. For example some sites I have designed have H2 tags of slightly larger size and in different font than normal H2 tags they are also of a grey color on a white background for design/estetics reasons. They are supposed to be marked as separators of major content block with the goal of not grabbing more attention than the content itself (nav links, groups of paragraphs). I don't think this is spammy, as user can clearly see the words, but it is a little too close for comfort with all this CSS paranoya going on...
If a site is rich in relevant content, then you're supposed to just list it.
If it happens to also have hidden keyword stuffing and you want to do something about that, then that's your private matter, which is completely independent from your task as an ODP editor. I'll sticky mail you some references to internal discussions about this topic, which may help clear up any potential confusion.
I apologize for starting this off topic tangent, let's not continue that here.
Still, we're discussing internal ODP policies here, which isn't really the purpose of this board. Suffice it to summarize that, very similar to wmw, the ODP is not in a position to play "search engine police".
Ok, I agree, let’s continue this in the right place. Thanks
If its got the visible content it should go in, if it doesn't it should not. DMOZ seems to be pretty straight forward about this. When submitting to any directory, its best to make the site look as professional as possible. This will usually help get a better description in most any directory.
