Read about "Team ODP"

Right.

 

it's not my eyes you need to worry about, it's the 7,000+ links in google for "dmoz bribe": http://www.google.com/search?q=dmoz+bribe&btnG=Search&hl=en

you people should have been doing some serious damage control a long time ago.

it's not about you personally, it's about ANY editor applicant who gets rejected... his second application should automatically go to another editor, no applicant should ever have to apply to the same editor twice.

that would go a long ways towards mitigating the possibility that an editor is asking for bribes.

i can't speak for site rejections because it's never happened to me, the site i submitted months ago simply got ignored, it's in a dead subcategory within an even "deader"(is that a word lol) category.

earlier in this thread some editors were rebelling against the concept that an editor is "in charge" of a category... the result of that is site submissions get ignored... how come editors are not held accountable for backlogged site submissions in the categories that they applied to be editors of? you asked for that category, wtf can't you maintain it? why isn't the dmoz using your record of incompetence in your performance review?

bottom line tho, the age of directories being a significant factor on the internet came and went a long time ago, so this discussion is rather moot... search has replaced any reason anyone has to go to a directory, although i will say that i still get a tiny amount of traffic from joeant.com.

 

Because we're volunteers maybe? Working for free? In our spare time? As such, we don't have to do squat if we don't want to, and we're accountable to no one.

Becoming an ex editor would what? Give me more free time to do other things. Leave the category or in my case categories, with one fewer editor, and for what? Open it up for other editors? Not really, categories can and do have multiple editors. Check the bottom of this category:
http://www.dmoz.org/Regional/North_America/United_States/

23 named editors, and they edit every category beneath them. Every category in the United States. You really don't have a clue, I'm afraid.

A lot of bluster, but no knowledge.

Added- I was going to edit, but, I think I'll go play my MMORPG instead. (so much to do, so little time, yawn)

 

Maybe rather then turning applicants away that apply to cats with editors, those editors and the cat should be looked at. There is still no accountability, but what is the difference between a cat that has no editor and one that has an editor that does nothing?

Tell that to all the editors that have been fired

 

The difference is, if an editor is there, he could decide to do something, whereas if he's not an editor, he most certainly won't.

You don't really think that honest individuals with good intentions, motivations, and the ability and willingness to work within the Guidelines would be turned down do you? Why ever would we do that? It ain't like we'd want to keep all that work to ourselves.

I know you'd like the doors thrown wide open for everybody, spammers included, but what do you think the Directory would look like then?

There's always a good reason for editor removals, but, we can't be fired because we were never hired, we volunteered .

I'm thinking about quitting myself, it sure won't hurt me any, I have lots of ways to spend my free time.

 

You are correct. An editor that is not doing something can certainly do something... once every three months. Whereas, someone that is rejected for the category can not do anything...even if the current editor only does something once every three months.

And no, I do not want spam in the ODP, in fact, Ive reported several sites that fit the bill for spam within the directory as a means to clear it up. I do not want spammers to become editors, but then that really has nothing to do with my post above either.

Should I now say de-volunteered? Though thanks for skipping the point

 

Lets see I got one warning based on partial sentences taken out of content from this forum to prove someone's fake or fantasy charges, so much for getting plenty of warnings. Whole process is wide open to abuse since if editor doesn't know a meta willing to stand up for him/her and defend him/her, his/her chance are zero since nobody asks editor to justify his/hers actions.

Also if this is volunteer project with goal of improving everything it is very odd that editors get fired as if they are working in some privately owned company in which boss can fire anyone he doesn't like - no second chances possible!?

Since whole removal process is top secret without removed editor ever knowing anything about it there are no evidence on how it is done so meta claims on following some strict procedures have roughly same weight as corruption claims without proof.

Problem is there is barely any feedback, after being approved editor is left on his/her own and nobody will contact him/her to see if he/she needs help, tips on how to improve etc. basically unless editors already knows someone who will tutor him/her there is little chance that editor will stick at DMOZ for long.

Odd someone might think that DMOZ would have more interests in keeping experienced editors instead of removing them and doing way more harm to the project instead of simply downgrading them to fewer categories?

 

Then it is good thing your not volunteering in the Red Cross.

 

Any actions as a result of the unproven allegations would have to be dealt with by AOL legal. Its their responsibility to decide what, if anything further needs to be done. Certainly editors would like to see more, but unfortunately thats beyond our control.

All editor applications are viewable to all Meta's and branch catmods. Anyone of us can choose any application we wish to view and/or process. There is no 'one' editor reviewing all applications in one category, it's not very common at all for the same Meta or catmod to review different applications from the same applicant.

How so? Bribery attempts are usually made to editors to list sites, not to approve applications.

No one editor is in charge of any one category. Thats a fact, not a concept to rebel against. Editors are not held accountable for backlogged site submissions in any category because the view of the directory is not that of a backlog of submissions anywhere. Rather, its a bounty of suggested resources that an editor may choose (if they so desire to) to use in order to build the directory. There are many, many resources editors can choose from to find sites. Public suggestions are one of those. In some categories they are a necessity, other categories they are worthless. Some editors add hundreds of sites and never look at the suggested pools, while others only look in the suggested pools for possible inclusions. Personally for example when I work in Regional (my main area) I find with the exception of the Travel, Real Estate, and Car Dealerships, the suggested pool of sites is usually pretty helpful. In Business (another area I frequent often) I rarely if ever even look in a categories submitted site suggestions. When I do, its usually to pick out a few of the ones with decent attempts to properly describe the sites. Normally I will simply come into a category with a list of URL's found on my own research (phone books while travelling, newspaper ads, internet searches, etc) instead.

Volunteering a minimal amount of free time is not a record of incompetence. Editors are constantly under peer review, if an editor is poorly or abusively editing any other editor (meta or not) can see their work and can send feedback or file abuse reports. A named editor does not prevent a new editor from joining that category normally, and it certainly doesn't prevent the 200+ editors with directory wide permissions from working there if they are so interested.

If it was rather moot, there wouldn't be all these forums with specific sections dedicated to directories, nor all the discussion. There is plenty of room for everyones ideas, be it search engines, directories, wiki's, whatever. No one is forcing anyone to use or like one over the other. Anyone who thinks dmoz is more important than any other ways to promote their site, is misguided at best. As an editor for joeant.com (all be it not very active) I am glad it helps.

As I mentioned above, the presence of a named editor in the category is irrelevant to whether a new applicant is accepted in the category or not. The one exception to that, would be if the category its self was so tiny that finding sufficient listable sites was possible. It is not often but its possible. In all the applications I have processed and those I have seen processed by others, none I have witnessed were because there was another named editor in the category that was being sought after.

I am not sure I am following you here. If the editor named on a category isn't doing anything, they will time out after 4 consecutive months of doing nothing. If they haven't timed out they are probably doing something elsewhere, and if they are only making one edit every 4 months to stay active, thats one more edit than would have been made otherwise. I still see no problem there. If that editor is making poor edits, any other editor can easily look and see them. They then can take the appropriate actions - either by sending feedback or reporting abuse.

Editors are not required to perform more than one edit in four months. That doesn't mean that aren't accountable if that one edit is poor or abusive. Editors who have been removed have been held accountable for their actions.

 

I find that hard to believe anyway... look at how I have been treated while as an editor and after I quit. I was an editor for three months while the ODP was in major disrepair and got 27 total edits, most of which were minor or test edits to see how things worked, and while I listed my own site, along with others, these things are all held against me.

Though it does seem that Team ODP is more willing to kick an editor out that has thousands of edits then bother giving them a dashboard warning. So maybe there is truth to the statement.

 

Who is holding it against you? While an editor did you get some feedback and/or treated poorly? Or are you basing that on something in this forum?

You have completely missed the point of post. I never said an editor with 1000's of edits wouldn't be issued a warning, rather that they should have the experience to better. Warnings are issued in most cases and don't every expire. Some cases require more immediate action, the severity of the problems dictate response and the response is a careful result based upon Meta discussion. Its not a rush to judgment push of the button.

 

That's right. I did get a warning from a Meta for joining Digital Point. I applied once for re-instatement though but that was way before the crash. Would you like to go into details with rest ? Motsa et al ?

As a volunteer editor you need to make sure that your categories are updated. That was the issue there was once an editor in my category that does not do squat. Yes, as an editor your accountable to your category, though maybe a volunteer, because don't apply to be an editor if you can't keep it up. That's just going to be for what, Beauty Points ?

 

In the internal forums read the thread I started about a lack of an appeals process, and the thread about editors that people miss. I questioned the guidelines and was called a troll and worse, yet I tried to remain as civil as possible, even when no one was civil too me.

After I quit was when I learned my total edit count. That was due to editors bringing it up. Odd how they can go around talking about my edit history but everything else is a matter of confidentiality. I'm also continuously told that I quit because I got my site listed while that was clearly not the case. They back up that claim with my low edit count again....

If you'd like names and posts, then feel free to contact me on YAHOO or through PM... as that is, for the better part, too far out of the scope of this thread.

 

Thats not necessary, you can put it all together in an abuse report if you feel someone has violated the Policies of Communication and Privacy. It will be investigated and appropriate action taken based upon the evidence you provide. Similarly if you felt the internal forums were in violation of the Communications Guidelines, an internal abuse report could have been filed.

 

Many of us don't have just one category, we have access to thousands, . Not likely that any one editor could keep up with every one of those. If you do the math, 500,000 categories divided by a possible 7,000 editors, most of whom are in small categories?

Let's say that only 50% of editors are in small categories, 500,000 - 3500 editors = 496,000 categories are being handled by the other 3,500 editors, no small task.

 

I am very impressed by your mathematical knowledge for a first year high school though it seems the numbers are Dust in the Wind (Kansas).

 

That was all in 2007. Now we're in 2008. I vote we make this year better than the last. Best start, bury this tired old discussion and the tired answers it'd engender.

 

To the very best of 2008 for you too RJ. Wow that's my company name.

Also I hope most of the editors do a better job this year and concentrate on the betterment of the ODP rather than spamming forums RZ, DP and more plus Wikipedia. There are a lot of things to be done and continued listings to the growing number of sites in the web.

 

You have assumed that the task of an editor is to clear the submitted sites, that is just an incorrect assumption, that is not the task of an editor. Submitted sites are one source, not the only source and many editors do not use them at all.

It ignores that editors also become involved in other tasks, some build tools to enable other editors to work more efficiently and catch spammers, others mentor new editors officially and unofficially. Circumstances of any individual and how much time they can offer also change.

And for those of us who have local categories and can edit anywhere, are we responsible for all the categories, I don't even know what half of them are let alone edit in them. Are we responsible for the categories with no named editor? that would be as impossible as having responsibility for every category.

Your view is based on what I can only presume is your experience, that of being an editor in a small category and feeling responsible for that category and thus projecting that to every editor, but I hope I have shown that is just not how many, especially experienced editors, feel or work.

 

How did you come up with that assumption. Your twisting the quotes and answers. I am not Q that you could twist at your discretion. Don't I know that Spiderman is different from Batman and Superman is from the Fantastic 4. Sorry Q.

Really revr ? I don't drink English Tea as it drives me nuts with the accent. You'll be a great mentor in history.

Yeah Right. What do you know about my experience ? Don't I know what you are saying ?