Brizzie Are you aware that this is a year 2006 and not 1990? To speak of technical difficulties and server resources for a database of 5,000,000 or even 10-15,000,000 records is nothing but an excuse. How does sending back an email that we received a submission is going to help a spammer or do you think we need to tell them that we have classified it as spam? Why not when a user wants to submit again, just do a simple check and inform them that it is in our system and they don't need to submit again? What is wrong if a user that was rejected, improve his site and if the quality is good, we list it? Don't we want to list quality site or are you against helping people on principal? I can not understand why shouldn't be interested in webmasters opinions? Aren't they most frequent users of Internet that will advice people on what resource to use? How about websites that is owned by Realtors, mom and pop business operation and anybody else that submit their site? Is DMOZ only a resource for DMOZ editors and we don't care about anyone else's opinion?
As you seem so well informed, lately there was this game going on about getting outed or outing oneself. You seem to be one of the rare species, kind of leftover, just too nice to be true. I am almost sorry for being so suspicious.
Yep. I've explained this before as have others - the database is not set up in a way that would make a search on unreviewed lists simple to create and zero cost to maintain. And it would need to be filtered so as not to give out information the community does not want to release. Everything has a cost and when the pot is finite you have to make choices. The ability to search for unreviewed sites across the entire directory would be a fantastic editor tool but editors don't have this. DMOZ's limited resources are assigned to other priorities. It isn't an excuse, it is a simply fact of life. You know I disagree with many DMOZ priorities and there are dozens of things I would like to see attention paid to before this particular feature was even considered but you cannot do everything all at the same time. I would say personally a much higher priority is to vastly improve the search facilities for listed sites and I would hazard a guess that one is on the agenda somewhere. There are loads of improvements you could do with editor dashboards to improve efficiency - probably on the list. A huge difference could be made by much improved anti-spam tools - bet those are on the list. Services for submitters will always be at the bottom of the list of priorities because DMOZ positively does not provide services to submitters! That doesn't mean that a lot of guidelines and instructions, even the submission screens, could not be vastly improved for the benefit of editors mainly. Site self-assessment is one. Maybe forcing the provision of a valid email address by requiring a validation code. But what a waste of time that would be. You ALREADY GET A CONFIRMATION SCREEN when you submit. Why not say on that screen, "print this off, you will not get an email". 10 minutes work, one off, no maintenance. See the answer about the database not being set up to do that easily. Development work. Maintenance work. And other priorities for the resources. I don't disagree with that one. But distinguish between spam and genuine submitters (not always easy for the inexperienced editor). I would like to see rejection notes categorised and would have no objection to certain categories of rejection being relayed back to the submitter automatically. But again it is development work and that has to be prioritised - I had no influence over priorities as an editor, as a former editor I would think that has diminished further! Depends on the webmaster. If the opinion is self-interested and self-promoting then it is irrelevant since the objectives of DMOZ are solely targetted at the users of the data - the intention is to remove SEO techniques as a factor in the data that is produced and focus only on the usefulness of the site to the end user. 99.999% of my editing was done from a surfer's perspective - did I find this site useful? Would others find it useful? List it. Marketing, including web marketing, is about getting users to your site regardless of how useful it is compared to competitors, and it has destroyed several major search engines. So the views of webmasters anxious to improve their marketing effectiveness are of no interest to DMOZ. Nor to Google I would guess. The views of surfers are important. The views of downstream data users are important. The views of the editors who do the work for nothing are important. I don't believe enough is done to determine the views of any of those groups including editors - polls are permitted within the DMOZ internal forums but are never used for serious issues or for determining priorities. That is a big mistake IMO and a factor in the decline in editor numbers. One last thing on feedback that is a major confidentiality issue. How do you know that the submitter is the web owner, or their authorised agent? Submission was not intended for web owners but for surfers to suggest their favourite sites. Be nice if you could get the lowdown on faults with your competitor sites by submitting it, wouldn't it? I don't imagine the competitors would be very happy at all. When I was young and idealist I thought the problems of the world could be solved very easily if only people would... As I got older I began to realise that "for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction" is generally the case. These things are never as easy as simply saying they are easy.
Brizzie I know that in real life you work as project manager but I don't think I will ever hire you for one of my projects since it seems to me that you are always so concerned about WHAT CAN NOT BE DONE instead of WHAT CAN BE DONE. I see technical problems that are nothing more than small bump on the road and you imagine these unclimbable mountains. There are many people with technical knowledge in this forum and inside DMOZ, should we ask them how difficult it is to fix these problems and what is the "huge" resources that is needed? Why can't we fix the database to do what it suppose to do, instead of using it as an excuse for every failure year after year after year? To implement a logical procedure for submission or to fix the database that can function properly are not revolutionary scientific research, it is a very simple job that can be done with very little resources in a matter of couple of month but I suppose this will be too difficult for powers in DMOZ since they can not even maintain a standard PHP forum for their own editors.
Thank you, it is a weight off my mind; I wouldn't like to have had to refuse you. Since the vast majority of the projects I manage are for agencies involving law enforcement of one kind or another I suspect managing one of yours might blight the rest of my career somewhat. No, I am telling you about having to choose priorities when resources are finite. Obviously since your own resources are infinite the concept may be somewhat alien to you. I am not saying the job is impossible, I am saying that the database would need to be redeveloped to do what you want it to do, and there are a heap of factors that need to be weighed and managed in such an operation. And you clearly have no concept of the nature of major corporation IT development standards where the actual work itself is a minute proportion of the overall process. Long gone are the days of half-baked, half-cocked "just do it" developments within large corporations. You are assuming that the powers that be think the database is broken and needs fixing. Maybe it does, but is it that broken it needs to be fixed before the 1001 other things *you* want DMOZ to do now, this minute. I have already told you what I would do ahead of what you want, so our priorities are different. And both our priorities are probably different to those of the Admins, and the Admins probably want to do some things AOL won't fund. But you are a current editor, I am not. If you believe so strongly in what you are saying then have the debate internally and use all your powers of persuasion to convince them you are right. Good luck!
I have been working with computers since 1976. 1- Designed a high school acceptance system for a European country in 1992 that is still used to this day. 2- Designed a billing system for all the hospitals in a European country in 1995 that is still used today. 3- Designed the internal system for a European space agency in 1996. I have been retired more or less since 1997 and my interest in these fields are more of hobby than professional but I can not imagine that it has become harder to do anything in this field instead of easier. I still remember the mentality of people from the time that I was involved with government agencies, let's have a meeting, let's do a study, let's talk more, let's have another meeting, let's do anything except really doing something that is of any use. The development process is not defined as let's sit around and do nothing. I do not think in a field that things change on daily basis, 6-7 years should be considered this "minute".
You're kidding me right? That is 9 years of process development you have missed. Companies take configuration managment seriously these days coz they realised how much it cost not to - Y2K wasn't so much about fixing things but about no-one could prove nothing needed fixing coz they'd all gone on their merry way just doing things and not following detailed processes. Well having worked directly for government agencies and for private companies managing work for government clients, the private companies are, IMO five or ten times as bad as the agencies when it comes to process bureaucracy. Again you are assuming that anyone within DMOZ apart from you thinks the system is broke. No-one has started work on the changes you want because they have never been on the to-do list, i.e. it hasn't started on the development cycle yet and is unlikely to do so until the powers that be decide it is a worthwhile thing to do - persuade them if that is what you want. Good luck!
That sounds like my experience with bureaucracies as well, gworld. "A committee is a cul-de-sac down which ideas are lured and then quietly strangled." ~ Sir Barnett Cocks (1907 - 1989)
I also mentioned that I still keep up in this area by reading the materials and testing new tools but as a hobby. It seems just doing something and putting the icompetent in charge is exactly how DMOZ functions, so if any organization is in need of real help in this area it would be DMOZ. If they constantly use the database as the reason for their failures and why there can never be any improvement of DMOZ procedures, then I think it is very reasonable to draw the conclusion that the system is broken. I have been trying to convince the powers in DMOZ to fix the problem but it seems that a "broken" database is more beneficial to some editors than a functioning one.
I wish I had never bitten... You are the one saying there are "failures" because it suits your purposes to define them as such. But it is only your opinion. Others have different opinions which are just as valid and that does not mean nefarious purposes or hunger for power. You've been posting on external forums where only a tiny number of editors even look, and even fewer are willing to debate. These types of thing can only be dealt with internally. And your first hurdle is to convince people that the database is broke. AOL inherited the database so it may not comply with current AOL database structural standards. But suppose it does - to get a change you have to persuade an entire corporate body that its database standards need revision. And then it can only change within that corporate standard, which may still not be suitable for what you want it to do. Then you are talking about systems analysis, systems design, redevelopment, documentation, integration, testing, validation. And then you have the new database. Now you can start thinking of new features and they go through all those stages again. And I didn't mention configuration management, risk management, funding, and a few other bureaucratic niceties. And for many of these tasks resources would be needed from various AOL sections which are likely to have competing requirements from other parts of the organisation than DMOZ. Anyway, this is becoming a pointless discussion. You will carry on citing incompetence and assigning nefarious motivations because that is what you do. And I can carry on telling you about how major organisations do IT in the 21st Century. It doesn't matter whether I agree or not on how things are done these days, it is what it is and you work with it or carry on banging your head against the wall.
1. Why are you assuming that external forums are the sole focus of gworld's attempts? Could it not be that he has in the past attempted change from within DMOZ and/or may still be doing so? Internal pressure and external pressure are not mutually exclusive. 2. You have said that you resigned/retired from DMOZ at least in part because of your frustration with efforts to effect change from within. Why should it be any different for gworld?
Gworld has been fighting this battle since before brizzie resigned, so he would know first hand that there has been no attempt internally, it really is only in external forums. I'm still an editor, I read the internal forums and I've never seen anyone bring this up internally. Of course it's possible that he did and I missed it, but gworld is very persistant. I doubt any attempt he made would fade away quietly or be easy to miss.
I would remind you that gworld is not his DMOZ name. How do you know what he has or has not been doing internally?
I read all the forums every day. The topic has not been discussed. Added... Unless he brought it up in another language. I only read the forums that are English. I suppose that's possible.
I seem to recall the occasional throwaway reference to automated submission status requests but certainly no major debate I can recall. And last year there was a request for editors to state a wish list of things they want for the future which went on for many pages (50 posts a page inside) and I don't recall it coming up there at all. Yep, I disagree with the priorities which I consider "fluff" with little substance, and failing to address serious flaws such as ... (well you know what they are). By retiring I realise I forfeit any possible influence on DMOZ direction but gworld remains an editor so has obviously not given up, and could start a debate.
When you consider that the number one complaint about DMOZ over the years has been the absence of feedback, and that the standard canned DMOZ response is "that has been brought up many times and the decision has always been that it is not going to happen" (without any real explanation other than the standard responses about how that would just lead to spamming the directory), you can perhaps understand my surprise when I now learn it really hasn't been discussed. My point was that you resigned in frustration about the futility of engaging in debates in the inner sanctums. I would suggest that gworld, facing similar frustration, decided to take the debate outside the internal forums as a way of trying to pressure change. And I would suggest that, while I don't fault you for the choice you made, it seems rather unfair to me for you to fault gworld for the choice he made. Why suggest that gworld should be in there beating his head against the same wall you gave up on?
This question has been discussed both in internal forum and RZ, it was not more than 2-3 weeks ago that hutch and an admin had some nonsense postings about this subject again with all the usual excuses. It almost sounded like that DMOZ uses no computer and hutch is writing all the listings on a piece of paper in his house. Minstrel has asked a very good question. If this matter has never been really discussed in DMOZ then how is it that so many editors, use the excuse that it causes more spamming as a reason for not giving out submission reports?
Was the discussion at Resource-Zone, or in internal forum? I seldom read RZ (remember, it is an outside forum) and I'm sorry but I don't recall this being discussed internally. As I said, maybe it was and I missed it somehow. A good question indeed, and one I can't answer. I haven't seen discussion regarding the issue, but I have seen metas say that it has been discussed and I've seen other editors repeat it. Just a wild guess, but perhaps it was discussed in the private meta forum? Umm... because he enjoys it?