DMOZ Top Listed Domains

[dvduval]

I know there are some opportunists that are editors, and to some degree there are checks and balances, but I believe certain Metas pretty much do whatever they want. Some of these can be justified, so please don't think I am saying these are not supposed to be there (judge for yourself). Here is a listing of the domains with the most listings in DMOZ:
http://www.whois.sc/internet-statist...-listings.html
If you look, I think you will find some real winners (sarcastic tone of course).

[dannysullivan]

This is a great list, but it implies that those with many listings are abusing the OPD in some way. No one gets a listing withing the OPD without an OPD editor approving it. If there's any abuse, the OPD editors themselves shouldn't be approving so many listings or should be locking further submission from a particular domain, if they sense they are getting spammed. To imply that someone is getting hundreds or thousands of listings through some type of backdoor isn't flying with me. IE, that is a site that doesn't have some particular editor on the inside working for it. That's always possible, of course.

[dvduval]

If you look deeper into the list, you will see lots of porn sites.

I don't think the ODP is very "open" anymore. If they really want to be "open", I suggest they mark which listings belong to editors for public view, not actually show the editor's name, just mark all sites that editors have signified they have an interest. That way it will be much easier to find abuse. There would not be so many complaints if there were more checks and balances in place.

[Nacho]

Originally Posted by dannysullivan

This is a great list, but it implies that those with many listings are abusing the OPD in some way. No one gets a listing withing the OPD without an OPD editor approving it. If there's any abuse, the OPD editors themselves shouldn't be approving so many listings or should be locking further submission from a particular domain, if they sense they are getting spammed. To imply that someone is getting hundreds or thousands of listings through some type of backdoor isn't flying with me. IE, that is a site that doesn't have some particular editor on the inside working for it. That's always possible, of course.

Danny, I completely agree with this. It is the same reason why it was reported back in the Can you have more than one listing in DMOZ? thread, which also points the same list as dvduval's.

[dvduval]

We really have no way to check ODP. If checks and balances exist for upper level Metas, I don't think we will ever know the full story.

[AussieWebmaster]

This is an intriguing list... though obviously the popular domains are not necessarily all from the same people.

[cbp]

I don't think the ODP is very "open" anymore. If they really want to be "open",

As you have claimed to be an editor, you should know exactly what the "Open" in the name means. Why make it want to mean something else?

[morepro]

DMOZ is a joke... too bad we need it. Btw - how do we signup to get paid, (oops) I mean signup to be an editor.

[Marcia]

That list has been around for several years - I remember when it was first put up.

How come all of a sudden, after all this time has elapsed since it's initial introduction, this is suddenly now news? Any particular reason why?

I believe the members over at Cre8asite forums are asking the same question about this same post that was posted over there

http://www.cre8asiteforums.com/viewtopic.php?t=25797

[Nacho]

Originally Posted by Marcia

How come all of a sudden, after all this time has elapsed since it's initial introduction, this is suddenly now news? Any particular reason why?

Last kicks of survival for DMOZ, maybe? Another round of critiques to spot the obvious biggest failure for this directory, while the success of it starts to diminish (sadly)?

No idea

[dvduval]

Originally Posted by Marcia

That list has been around for several years - I remember when it was first put up.

How come all of a sudden, after all this time has elapsed since it's initial introduction, this is suddenly now news? Any particular reason why?

I believe the members over at Cre8asite forums are asking the same question about this same post that was posted over there

http://www.cre8asiteforums.com/viewtopic.php?t=25797

I think a better question is ...Why is it STILL news?
Could it STILL be a problem?
Yes, there are other forums discussing it too.

[MikeDammann]

Originally Posted by Marcia

That list has been around for several years - I remember when it was first put up.

How come all of a sudden, after all this time has elapsed since it's initial introduction, this is suddenly now news? Any particular reason why?

I believe the members over at Cre8asite forums are asking the same question about this same post that was posted over there

http://www.cre8asiteforums.com/viewtopic.php?t=25797

How can an unresolved issue ever become old? And why would it matter if it's been posted elsewhere as well? Forums are there to discuss issues as well as raise awareness.

[dannysullivan]

Just to further clarify some things, I jumped over to the Cre8asite thread, which in turn pointed at a blog post from someone I assume is an ODP editor, talking about multiple listings: http://www.dummies-guide-to-dmoz.org...le-categories/

This caught my eye:

DMOZ does not allow multiple submissions and a site owner who does so, might be considered to be spamming. Submitting to one Topical category and one Regional category, and submissions for multiple langauges are permissable.

Really? That was news to me. I've been writing about the OPD since it was literally born, and I didn't recall there being a flat out rule against multiple submissions. In fact, I'd been told in the past that if you had a relevant, unique URL that deserved to be listed somewhere, you could submit it regardless of whether you had a different URL listed somewhere else. I always advised people not to immediately jump in and try for 10 listings at a time, much less 100s or thousands. But increase the overall representation of your site in the ODP in an appropriate manner? Of course you would submit.

So how about them rules. I looked at the submission page:

Do not submit URLs that contain only the same or similar content as other sites you may have listed in the directory. Sites with overlapping and repetitive content are not helpful to users of the directory. Multiple submissions of the same or related sites may result in the exclusion and/or deletion of those and all affiliated sites.

That doesn't mean don't do multiple submissions. It means don't do multiple submissions of the same URL/resource in various places. If you have completely different content on different pages, I don't read that as a violation.

Digging further, I found this:
http://dmoz.org/help/cats.html#howmany

ODP categories are specialized enough so that in most cases a site doesn't need to be listed in more than one place. If a site offers information on a wide variety of topics, it will be placed in a broader category rather than in may specialized subcategories. For example, if you have a site selling tickets for concerts, football games, and amusement parks, the site would not be placed in all three categories. It will most likely be placed in a category for site selling tickets to entertainment events.

Which is just stupid. If you're a major site of interest equally to those buying football tickets and concert tickets -- and you have categories on those specific topics -- why wouldn't you multilist the same site or appropriate page within the site in those areas? But rules-wise, it would seem to suggest not to do the multiple submisison.

Over here
http://dmoz.org/help/submit.html

You should submit your site to the single most appropriate category that is directly relevant to your site's content. Please only submit your site one time. The ODP editors reserve the right to use their editorial discretion to determine which category or categories your site will ultimately be placed.

So here's the deal. Despite those rules, if I wasn't listed in another place I thought I probably should be in, I'd probably submit again. I'd especially be likely to do that if I ran a web site that I really felt was equal to another web site in quality and saw that the editors of the ODP were rewarding that site with multiple listings. Moreover, I'd contact an editor about this. I wouldn't immediately assume I was being penalized and someone else favored. I'd assume that I might need to educate the editors about why better listing of my content was in the interest of the audience the ODP aims to serve.

So that covers what a site owner might be doing in violation of the rules to get multiple listings -- or more accurately, to submit for multiple listings. Whether those actually get in depend on the editors themselves.

How about editors that are abusing? If this list has some entries that seem due to editor abuse, that page also lists the reporting form:
http://report-abuse.dmoz.org/

Disappointingly, finding that form through browsing the ODP help files isn't easy. In fact, I didn't find it at all. The best I found was this page:
http://dmoz.org/help/geninfo.html#abuse, which linked to this different form that isn't specifically about reporting suspected abuse: http://dmoz.org/cgi-bin/feedback.cgi?

Overall, the multiple listings issue has been around for a very long time at the ODP not to mention Yahoo. http://searchenginewatch.com/serepor...le.php/2166961 covers how bulk content was included back in 1999 from places like News.com, Wired and Time.

I think the problem for the ODP or any directory is when do multiple listings cross the line into crawler territory. Have they really reviewed thousands of subject specifici listings that one provider may have and continue to modify that, to ensure they are relevant. Should or shouldn't every category have a Wikipedia link, if one's available? Where do you draw that line?

[MikeDammann]

What I don't get is the need for 1,000s of cnn.com listings which lead to a "Content Moved" page.
Almost everytime I search for something like let's say "India News", I click on the cnn.com page listed and ... sure enough, the content which once got that page listed .... POOF gone!

I am wondering why nobody at the ODP has caught it yet and notified the editors not to list pages like those. Wouldn't it be smarter to just have a cnn.com search box on every DMOZ page out there? (just kidding, or semi-kidding)

There are also many sites that do have listings in several categories. Here is one I can think of: <snip>

I'm not trying to tell anyone how to do their job, but isn't it time to apply some common sense rather than posting the guidelines again and again.

Mike Dammann

[morepro]

Danny - Thanks for all of the info regarding the multiple listing rules... It seems that they don't know one way or another which it should be.

Based on my own experiences using DMOZ (and seriously how many people search directly from DMOZ.org), I don't use the category links to find what I'm looking for. I type in a search query and then analyze the results that come up; using the category links is like trying to find a needle in a haystack.

It would seem that your site would come up in those results whether you had one listing in DMOZ or 1,000; why the need for so many? The only reasonable answer I can think of is for SEO purposes. There is very little need to have your site visually appear in 1,000 categories.

Does anyone have data to support how DMOZ is most frequently used, whether it be through searches or through the category links?

DMOZ has been something like a "golden ticket" into Google and I personally think that there are site owners (aka Editors) out there that are, and have been, using the directory for personal gain.

I applied to become an editor once - never heard back from them. I submit sites all the time - never hear back from them. Despite all this, I see sites added in categories that I submit to all the time. I've even gone so far as to stop adding keywords & optimizing my DMOZ description in hopes that it will be added more easily - still nothing.

Just frustrated...

[MikeDammann]

DMOZ is being used quite frequently for research (by students, scientists etc.) looking for specific categories in which they prefer hand-edited results. There are many valuable categories within DMOZ and they are being searched for thru the search function as well as the catagory option.

Therefor, if you look at things from a user friendly perspective, multiple categories do make sense to me when the most applicable url from the site appears in the right results. The problem is that editors are being switched around and you cannot rely on what you get from editor to editor. The ODP has turned into chaos. There is no serious supervision and accountability, just opinions, interpretations and a lot of egos flying around.
A major clean-up would be more efficient than adding more editors and sites without taking care of current issues. but then again, who has the power to take charge and change things? Mostly we see editors and webmasters fight and argue while those who could change things (AOL/TimeWarner) seem to deny responsibility and don't really acknowledge ownership.
Mike

[AussieWebmaster]

This blog does not seem too active but there is some interesting stuff there:
http://www.corruptdmozeditor.com/

[NetinsertGuy]

I think the problem for the ODP or any directory is when do multiple listings cross the line into crawler territory. Have they really reviewed thousands of subject specifici listings that one provider may have and continue to modify that, to ensure they are relevant. Should or shouldn't every category have a Wikipedia link, if one's available? Where do you draw that line?

This is a very interesting question indeed for a directory developer. In my opinion directories should in general not deep index sites since deep indexing is already made at the site level. Most sites come with their own indexing system in the form of menu navigation, site maps, or some other form of site search. The purpose of a directory is to provide high level entry points into information resources in a given subject category. Each resource/web site has its own indexing and can be viewed as being a "micro directory" for the information resources contained in the site. In this way, a subject driven web search will be a hierarchical process which starts at a top level general directory and cascades through more specialized directories down to a web site with its own micro directory which will ultimately provide the web page that the user is looking for.

Deep indexing sites in a directory may bloat the directory with redundant information which will be provided anyway down the hiearchical linking chain. Then there are other issues such as deep link maintenance which, if left unattended, quickly tends to turn into deep link rot (unless you have an automated directory with continuous verification of directory listings).

[PhilC]

DMOZ is privately owned, and they can do what they want with it. They are not responsible to anyone outside DMOZ, and they are not there to help websites. It helps for a site to be listed in it but it's not of any great importance.

I knew of sites that have hundreds of listings, but that list was quite an eye-opener for me. Even so, it's not something that anyone outside DMOZ should complain about or has any need to complain about. For instance, one of my competitors had hundreds of listing when I only had one, but I was still all over the top of Google and doing very well - until Bourbon

When I was an editor, multiple listings were allowed apart from the usual one regional and one topical, provided that each entry merited it. Some sites have many entries because most of the listed pages are not available from the main site, or from each other. Others have multiple listings for distinct areas of the site when the areas, or even individual pages, merit being listed in specific categories, even though they are available in the main site. There is no hard and fast rule about it, and each submission is evaluated on its own merit, although other entires from the same site are obviously taken into account.

The bottom line for us is that no site or page has a right to be listed in DMOZ, and it's not really our business that some sites have a massive number of entries. Also, if some editors are abusing the system, they are abusing DMOZ, and not anyone else. Being listed in DMOZ, and the number of listings that some sites have, just isn't important enough to bother much about.

[dvduval]

I think is could be successfully argued that the greatest benefit to being listed in DMOZ is Google ranking.

I think it could be successfully argued that the structure of DMOZ itself is based on the idea that volunteers are helping to promote the greater good, casting selfish tendencies aside.

If anything, DMOZ is sort of a private Google club (IMHO).