You've worked up such a head of steam Brizzie that I almost fear to get scalded if I step in. Still I feel I should point out that close analysis of the stats reveals that the ODP actually lost fewer editors in 2005 than the yearly average (total editors for all time minus current editors, divided by seven.) What does that mean? I'm not sure. Could be that in years when the ODP took on more editors they also lost more. What I do know is that Admins want to retain good editors. Of course they do. But we need to consider human psychology. One thing that could make people hesitate to apply to edit is concern about how much time they would have to give to it. So it makes total sense that there is no time requirement. http://dmoz.org/help/become.html#time . People can contribute as much or as little as they want. They can leave and return years later. The less pressure there is, the more comfortable people are about volunteering.
ROFL. If the ODP lost the same number of editors last year as the yearly average (which is circa 10,000 a year) there would be no-one left to approve new editors. It stands to reason that if a trend of losing more editors than are recruited is a negative no matter which way you spin it. To get to 8000 editors on the books previous years must have averaged a net gain of over 1000 per year. So the project is 1250 short not just 250! Hence the dangers of publishing raw stats. Statistics, damned statistics, and lies. Naturally, but wanting, and knowing how and then implementing are entirely different matters. And an attitude of putting a positive spin on things, an admirable editor trait in most respects, leads to the problem being dismissed. That has always been the case and it has previously resulted in a net gain per year of 1000+ editors on average. So I can't see how that would change this year. A defeatist view would be that DMOZ has exhausted a large proportion of the pool of potential volunteer editors so recruitment would naturally slow. But it may also be that meta editors are being so much more selective in approving applications - no stats shown to prove that one way or another. In either event a good source of replacement editors would be those who have been editors and left (and not under a black cloud). How do you get them back? Find out why they left maybe.