Back in our initial post, we mentioned that this site would serve as a forum for editors to share their stories. Why they joined. What they get out of the experience and why it matters to them.

Below is the first of many posts from our editors talking about why they joined the community.

Everyone say "hi" to ODP Editor Laigh : )

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As a person who has recently been accepted as an editor in the ODP community I would like to share my perspective.

The background to me applying was simple. I have written a few websites over the last two or three years and of course during this time I had come across the ODP. The actual idea of many people from around the world coming together in a huge community really intrigued me and over time I decided that I wanted to become part of that community and try to be involved in making the Internet a better place.

I would like to point out at this time that NONE of my websites are listed in DMOZ and I declared ALL of them on my applications and I have declared ALL of them on the internal system, so believe me my motives weren't and aren't to do with my own sites, they are genuinely and honestly to do with being part of the project. I would also like to say that as a person new to the community I am not being influenced by any other editors in any way and I am writing this as a reflection of my own true feelings and experiences. I do not wish to make any political points or otherwise but just to pass on my experiences as somebody who has just started to edit.

I first applied to join the ODP as an editor about a year ago and at that time I was rejected. The rejection notice did not have any specific comments on it and I assumed this was because the reason was contained within the list that the e-mail already provided. I decided to leave my application for a while and as usual, life took over and I didn't re-apply until mid August 2007.

I received a rejection e-mail within about two days but this time I had a comment on it. It basically said that I had not filled in a certain part of the form correctly. I had a look and could have kicked myself. The form said in black and white what I needed to do but I hadn't done it right.

I had read the form religiously several times but this showed me that I had been looking at the form but not really reading it. I applied again with the parts fixed and within two days I received my joining e-mail to my complete surprise.

I immediately signed in and it was then that light began to dawn on me about the enormity of the actual community and the work that they do. It also dawned on me very quickly the reasons that you can only apply for a small category. There is so much to learn on how the system works and how to get started. I actually read for two days before I started to actually edit anything.

I quickly became enthralled with the community and now after two months or so have completed about 3000 edits. I really enjoy being part of this community and hope to be part of it for a long while.

To those reading this that are thinking of or have applied, there is a HUGE amount of help to be had. I have had nothing but encouragement from many folk in the ODP. Everybody from Metas to newbies like me have been eager and willing to help. The rules and regulations within the ODP are to make it run smoothly and in my honest opinion they are not hard to follow. They are just there to make it work. As I have been told before in the community, "The only daft question is the one you didn't ask"

All that is left for me to say is that if you are thinking of applying to be an editor, please do. It is a great experience, definitely worthwhile and brings a great deal of personal satisfaction.

Over the history of the project, DMOZ has had more than 70,000 volunteer editors worldwide. On average, there are approximately 6,000 active editor accounts at any given time.

What's impressive (at least to me) is that we do this out of a pure sense of giving back to the Internet Community. Editors take the time to organize and create useful resources in categories and topics that are of interest to us, not for money (side bar: looking forward to typically useless comments on that item) but for the sheer enjoyment of gathering quality information to help people find what they need-faster.

On average, DMOZ accepts 78 new editors per week, which is great. At the same time, we're interested in adding more. Specifically, we are interested in hearing from people who can continue to improve the data we provide for all of our users around the world.

So, while you're here, is there a topic that you're passionate about? Do you know of, or can you find, three sites that are perfect for that topic that aren't already listed? Would you like to be seen as a category expert and contribute to a global volunteer community that is relied upon by millions of searchers and many of the leading search engines on the planet? Then, we invite you to volunteer. : )

While you're here, type a query into the search box at the top of the page (make sure you click on the DMOZ.org tab before you click Search) and see if we have a category that interests you. If so, follow the steps mentioned at the bottom of that page and apply.

More information about becoming an editor is available at:

http://www.dmoz.org/help/become.html

and

http://www.dmoz.org/cgi-bin/apply.cgi

We look forward to hearing from you.

As the numerous responses to my first post show, this is one of the most common and controversial questions asked about DMOZ.

To answer this question, it is important to consider what DMOZ isn't.

DMOZ is not set up as a listing service for site owners. Site submissions are only one source for finding quality sites to add to the directory. Some editors choose to review submissions while other editors might prefer to (at first) find sites on their own through search engines, as links from related sites, in newspapers, on television, on highway billboards, etc. So...there are no guarantees that once you submit your site it will be reviewed within a specific amount of time.

There are also a number of practical reasons it can take a while for a site to get listed in DMOZ:

The site is submitted to an incorrect category. Many sites are submitted to categories that are either too broad, too narrow, or unrelated to the content of the site being submitted. Most of the time, incorrectly submitted sites are sent to the appropriate category for review, but that will usually increase the amount of time that a site will ultimately wait for review. Submitting your site to the single most specific category relative to your site's content will significantly improve your chances of getting your site reviewed.

The site is submitted to the wrong language section of the directory. For example, non-English sites are frequently submitted to the English-language section of the directory. As with sites submitted to the wrong category, editors have to redirect these sites to the correct language, which can increase the amount of time that they will await review.

The submitted site does not meet submission or editorial guidelines for inclusion. Quite often people submit sites that are incomplete, don't contain enough content, or consist primarily of syndicated or mirrored content. Uniqueness of content is one of the most important factors editors consider when reviewing a site for inclusion.

The category has a backlog of submissions. This can result when the popularity of the topic, which may attract large numbers of both listable and unlistable sites, doesn't match the interests of active or prospective editors. Submitting to one of these categories may mean a longer wait. (That doesn't mean you should submit your site to the wrong category just because you think it doesn't have a backlog – deliberately submitting your site to the wrong category is never a good choice.)

URBAN LEGENDS ( i.e. popular & fictional reasons ) as to why a site does not gain acceptance into ODP:

The category editor is corrupt and/or a competitor is keeping the site from being listed. DMOZ regularly receives allegations of corruption and abuse through its public abuse reporting system. Each report is thoroughly investigated and crosschecked. Most of these claims turn out to be baseless. In the rare case where there may be some truth to the allegation, the matter is dealt with immediately.

No one is monitoring the category. While a few categories in DMOZ may not have a listed editor that doesn't mean there's no one minding the store. All editors listed higher in a category's hierarchy can and do edit subcategories. In addition, many editors have permissions to edit anywhere in the directory.

I'm certain there will be no shortage of comments to this post, but please consider the topics listed above and re-check your submission application again.

And if/when you do submit, please...please....please avoid any claims/jokes/sarcasm of offering money to get accepted into DMOZ. Editors apply zero sense of humor to these types of statements and it is a sure fire way to ensure your site does not gain entry. Ever.

One of my future posts will include best practice recommendations for suggesting sites to editors.

Cheers.

Bob Keating
Managing Editor, DMOZ Staff

Yesterday the internet was all a flutter with reports and wide ranging theories as to why searches for "DMOZ" in Google were not returning the usual results. If you happened to miss those, I've included a couple of examples that can be found here, here, here and here.

While these made for great headlines and no shortage of comments and link backs...they were 100% off the mark.

Truth is, this is just one of those things that happens from time to time in the world of search.

We made some significant upgrades to our back-end systems to improve the stability of DMOZ. One of those changes required changing the root domain from dmoz.org to www.dmoz.org. What we all witnessed yesterday and what was reported by the great sites above was part of an index recognizing, adjusting and updating in real time. This was confirmed in discussions we had with Google and everything should be running smoothly now.

So go ahead and try a query for DMOZ. And if you don't see our site, clear your browser cache and try again.

Here is a screen grab taken 5 minutes ago.


You can also give it a shot in the search box above ( click the web link & enter query ).

DMOZ is not dying folks. We're growing every day. Globally.

Feel free to use that sound bite from now on in your future posts : )

Hello and welcome to the new DMOZ blog, the official source for information, insight, and updates about DMOZ, the Open Directory Project ( ODP ).

DMOZ is made up of thousands of passionate, volunteer category enthusiasts and experts from all over the world who donate their time to arrange their respective portion of the web. Thanks to their work, DMOZ is a starting place for browsing and searching the web. DMOZ data is also used by thousands of search engines and web portals to help people quickly and easily find information on the web.

To paraphrase Mark Twain, the rumors of DMOZ's death have been greatly exaggerated.

The editor community is very much alive and thriving. Thousands of new sites are added and updated every week, and we continue to receive hundreds of editor applications and suggested sites every day.

We thought now was the right time to open the door and start a conversation with the Web community about what's happening with the largest human-edited directory.

We intend to use this blog to:

- Provide authentic messages about DMOZ and the efforts of our volunteer community.
- Highlight enhancements, both current and future.
- Allow editors to showcase their categories and describe, in their own words, why DMOZ is so important.
- Recruit new editors. If you have access to the Web and are passionate about a category, find out how to apply.

Additionally we want to hear from you.

What do you think about DMOZ? Why do you use the directory or data? Is there something you would like to see fixed? When you've been around as long as we have, some people are bound to have great things to say, while others might have a few choice words based on their personal experience. Either way, we want to hear it :)

We plan on posting every week so grab the RSS feed or sign up for an e-mail alert to receive notification of new entries as they are posted.

Bob Keating
Managing Editor, DMOZ Staff