Yes, DMOZ depends on secrecy to protect the actions of editors that may or may not be ethical. That way they can be free to do whatever they want, having fewer checks and balances, which would raise the bar, and require more honesty.
David, I have much difficulty keeping a straight face when words like ethical and honesty come from you. Actually this is another example of how the open directory is held to impossibly high standards. What information does google release regarding individual banned sites? Exactly where do they publish the details of their ranking algorithm? Oh they couldn’t possibly do that because spammers would abuse it I hear you say. But yet the ODP is criticized for protecting exactly the same information that others jealously guard.
Why the secrecy? The people that treat websmasters like dirt and insult them daily on Resource Zone wouldn't want make themselves vulnerable to criticism by exposing themselves to scrutiny.
Agreed that the methods of detecting spam should be confidential since to reveal that information will assist the spammers in producing better examples that will beat the editors. It is also a fact that editors have been threatened with violence and stalked by disgruntled webmasters and editor safety is a priority. Editor intimidation is a reality, speaking as one who received sinister emails to my work email address and on several occasions I had to take the heat off other editors being put under pressure from webmasters. And we are not talking high spam areas but arts and small town Regional. Goodness knows what goes on in Adult, Gambling, etc. Against this is accountability. The DMOZ way is to make the accountability internal - every editing action by every editor is logged and accessible by every other editor from the day they join. This relies on people trusting DMOZ editors to keep their own house in order and whilst it generally does a very good job, it is absolutely crystal clear that some competitors of editors have been blocked. Why crystal clear - because editors have been caught and ejected, the complaint upheld. Why the strong impression that it does not keep its house in order. Because when a corrupt editor is caught very often, due to lack of resources, their own misdeeds remain in the Directory netting them ongoing advantages, and the competitors who were discriminated against remain unlisted. If the corrupt editor has done the damage they joined for then what do they care if they then get caught and evicted. The two sides are difficult to reconcile. The balance right now is probably perceived to be wrong as there is little external trust in DMOZ and its editors, most of which is unfair. I don't personally think you can go further in exposing the 99% of honest decent editors to intimidation - their personal safety must come first. I think there are probably ways that DMOZ could improve confidence in its ability to deal with abusive and corrupt editors by providing more detailed information about the results of complaint investigations. A suggestion I did come up with some time ago internally but which was squashed pretty quickly before it could be developed into a serious proposal was for a group of editors of all levels with a nose for corruption and abuse to form an anti-corruption specialism to do first line investigation of all complaints. The primary reason for squashing it was that such matters are the preserve of metas. Not because metas are any better or worse at detecting corruption but because it would mean letting go of jealously guarded information and tools to non-metas. Other editors can only investigate abuse to a certain level and then hand it over to metas from which point on they will hear nothing but silence. Not only is it highly frustrating for editors (and the public) to submit a complaint then hear absolutely zero let alone an explanation of why the complaint was not upheld or upheld, it generates an air of secrecy that inevitably outsiders (to the meta group) will see as being involved in cover-up. It can be solved with some imaginative thinking but we are talking DMOZ management here so don't hold your breath.
It is no about tools, without the possibility for corruption and abuse, many of the "senior" editors will not continue with DMOZ. The safety issue that you mention is total BS and smoke screen, a proper investigation of abuse will provide no more information than what is already available about the editor. The amount of information that is provided is decided by the editors themselves and in reality can be totally bogus since I strongly suspect that many of the "senior" editors are actually the same persons.
Meta editors have access to notes about editors - the nature of those notes is unknown except to metas. I suspect they also have access to editor IP addresses. And whilst every rejection of a site in Unreviewed is recorded in one or two places including against the URL it does not appear on the editor's personal editing log yet must be accessible somewhere since metas appear to be able to detect an editor doing click through rejections. Not true. I have personal experience of intimidatory tactics from spam webmasters and it wasn't funny. The mole who provided the information to track me was baited, trapped, and removed with the aid of an Admin but other editors may give in to sinister threats without reporting it.
Wasn't that suppose to be normal since you were a former Notorious Resource Zone Member that humiliates and abuse Innocent Webmasters which includes a lot of members of DP ? Not an attack or harrassment just TRUTH.
Does anyone here not know my editor name was oneeye or that I was an RZ regular? It's not a secret. I don't think I was ever viewed here or anywhere else as notorious and I never knowingly humiliated or abused any innocent webmasters in RZ. I exposed quite a few liars and spammers, which comprised about 50% of posters there, after examining their submission histories and websites in detail. Quite why spammers would draw attention to their mirrors and affiliate sites by asking a bunch of highly experienced editors to check their site status I will never know. I also spent a lot of time there helping the innocent webmasters with decent sites and in a small number of cases listed the really excellent sites being asked about immediately. I am appalled by some of the responses I have seen from a very small number of editors there and once even went as far as to hit the Report Bad Post link for a meta response (and it was edited by a moderator). But I fail to see how that relates to harrassment from webmasters via corrupt editors when I uncovered spam listings and removed them. Or other editors being threatened with violence if they don't list a particular site in a particular way.
Isn't this also job for police and ISP abuse services? Even here, in backwater like Croatia, sending threats via e-mail will get your ISP account suspended quickly (heck they block your account for a month or two if you spam few post to wrong newsgroup!) and our police likes cases in which they can easily track down person since ISP provides all details - its easy way for them to get there solved cases number up without having to deal with real criminals. Me! Me!