How to get listed in DMOZ, the easy way. 2 days.

Exactly, gworld. Just more hot air and bafflegab from DMOZ.

 

Once upon a time people could buy expired domains with listings in the ODP. True. In some cases a change of content would be noticed and the listing removed. But with 4 million plus listings, obviously it would be a mistake to rely on every hijacked listing being noticed by an editor or reported by some helpful user.

So a new system was adopted. This was some time ago. It has certainly been around long enough for any reasonably active editor to be aware of it. So once again, I'm afraid that GWorld is promoting a picture that bears no resemblance to the real world. The proof of that is a few posts back - a puzzled person trying to find an expired domain on the ODP and failing utterly.

 

The systems do not check for changed content if the domain registration is renewed in good time. Therefore it is possible to buy a listed domain from the owner, change the content, and the automatic systems will not spot it. However, if you allow your domain to get within a few days of expiry without renewing it a robot will remove the listing pending an editor checking it manually. Therefore if you buy an already expired domain to get a DMOZ listing you are wasting your time, it will already have been removed. There is clearly a database somewhere with domain expiry dates, which is compared on a very regular basis to listings, and an automated tool does the delisting. It is exeptionally efficient at the job it is designed to do. It would be nice if other forms of hijacking could be so easily dealt with.

 

Well that was very helpful to would-be hijackers Brizzie.

 

I wouldn't say so, what are they going to do with it Genie? Gworld has already given lessons in hijacking in DP and mentioned it in this thread so it is obvious it does not check changes in domain ownership and content. How it is actually done I have no idea, that was a guess, but it seems obvious to me, there wouldn't be any other way. Seems daft to me to be coy about something anyone with a couple of braincells could work out in two minutes.

 

I have to defend brizzie here, for he's preventing webmasters from wasting their time and money.

It's a lot harder for webmasters to find a listed domain that will soon expire, one that the current webmaster will want to unload - probably from a good sum of money. Surely more than the current quick-listing "bribe" value of $350, which in my opinion is a complete joke.

Given that the actual value of a DMOZ listing lies somewhere between a nickel and a dime, and the trouble involved, I doubt it's going to be a rampant problem.

 

For that reason, it was not obvious to Genie and you exposed something new.

 

It is hardly "exposing" something. Makes it sound bad. Protecting the directory against hijacking of expired domains is good. Besides it was a guess, I wasn't giving away secrets or insider knowledge since as an editall I was never party to the workings of such tools. Perhaps Genie thought I actually knew and was giving something away. But if you were making insinuations about Genie's braincells I can assure you that she is one of the most intelligent and respected people you could ever come across. More times than not internally Genie and I have been on opposite sides of debates but if the Admin roles ever did come up for election and I had a vote she would get mine.

 

Blimey! I'm overcome Brizzie. As you know I don't yearn for power though.

 

Lucky for you, Genie, Admins have no power and yield no influence, so you shouldn't let power shyness keep you from accepting the position.

 

Isn't that the best kind of leader?

 

Yes, that is all DMOZ need to solve it's problems. Another middle aged woman as admin who will blindly support corrupt and abusive practices, no matter what.

 

What daft things you do say GWorld. (sigh) Scarcely seems worth replying to such nonsense, but just in case anyone reading this really needs me to state my position - I am against corruption and abusive practices.

My solution to the problem would be the entire removal of Adult, along with Gambling and online pharmacies, and hiving off Shopping. All commercial categories would stop accepting submissions.

In fact my manifesto (if I had one) would be a whole lot more radical than that. So just be grateful that there are no elections forecast for the Admin posts, and I wouldn't be standing if there were. In my hands the ODP would become non-commercial in every way.

 

Sounds great, what about Hate groups?

But what is non-commercial today? With exception of academic and government websites and few ones which can sustain themselves from donations by some miracle everyone is else is trying to make a buck with Adsense or some other affiliate.

 

My solution to the problem would be the entire removal of Adult, along with Gambling and online pharmacies, and hiving off Shopping. All commercial categories would stop accepting submissions. +1

 

Totally agree

 

You see, that is why you would get my vote.

 

Ah Ivan, you put your finger on a major problem.

The advantage of being in opposition is that I don't have to make my policies work. In truth there would be massive difficulties with any radical programme of change in the ODP.

Frankly I feel that Adsense has become a scourge of the Internet, though Google didn't intend it that way at all. If I had a few spare millions, I'd be tempted to create a truly non-commercial search engine, that not only didn't carry advertising itself, but didn't index sites which carry advertising. Drastic, but the only way to cut out the flood of MFA rubbish.

 

There is an interesting point here.

Non-commercial sites often carry Adsense or other advertising as a way of subsidising hosting. It enables a great deal more non-commercial material to be available on the Internet.

A business that puts advertising for its direct competitors prominently on their site has got to be either completely mad or the primary business of the site is in fact advertising revenue. Either way there is a good possibility that the content is not up to scratch.

 

I knew someone would shoot that one down. I'm serious though. The Net is so gigantic now, and getting bigger all the time, that I think it would actually be feasible to index only material without advertising (think Wikipedia, BBC, universities, free online texts, etc.) and still supply information on pretty well anything. Shopping sites are distinguished by other features and could be filtered out that way. Business - tricky. You could describe business sites as supplying information on the business.