19 replies to this topic

[kensplace]

lsblogs.com used to be in dmoz, and the google directory based on dmoz.

Its not now.

No communication received at all, I only found out by accident.

Any ideas why it would be removed, and can someone who is a dmoz editor check to see when it was removed, Im curious as to the date. Why would be useful to.

Its not the end of the world, not much traffic from it but Im curious (especially as to the date, and the reasons given for the deletion)

[joedolson]

I wouldn't worry about DMOZ --- the editors have complete editorial control, and if they decided to remove your site for ANY reason, they are free to do that. You have no recourse except to resubmit. However, resubmission would PROBABLY have your submission going through the same editor that delisted you, since editing is category based.

The lack of communication is my biggest problem with DMOZ...this doesn't really surprise me much.

Maybe if Jean Manco were around she'd have something to say about what might have happened...but I haven't seen her here for quite a while.

[rynert]

lsblogs.com used to be in dmoz, and the google directory based on dmoz.

Its not now.

ok - just for humour value I will state the cyncial view - the new editor has a directory himself and needs to thin out the competition.

[bobbb]

the new editor has a directory himself and needs to thin out the competition

According to their rules that should be a no-no. :angel:

Does your site fit the category "Sites Generally Not Included"?
http://www.dmoz.org/...html#notinclude

I'll answer my own question. It does not fit the "Sites Generally Not Included" because they have such a category.

http://www.dmoz.org/...gs/Directories/

Edited by bobbb, 06 October 2007 - 04:04 PM.

[kensplace]

I cant even waste my time posting in the resource zone, as I cant seem to get them to send the confirmation email required before I start posting.

Its odd mine went, but several others stayed, that should not be in that category, I can see one straight away that is not a blog directory, but a photo hot-or-not rating site (ie not a blog one), another that is clearly using dmoz's data without the proper attribution where it should be, another that is parked, several that are not even directories, but are collections of postings from blogs, but *not* a directory, a directory with only a few hundred entries, and after that I gave up checking them at random, but Im sure there are more examples of the fact the category has not been cleaned up, despite the fact it is a small category that only takes a few minutes to quickly go through and spot the obvious.

After looking in the resource zone though, I can imagine how the conversation would go.

Me: Hi, My site <cant give the url> is no longer listed in dmoz, can you tell me when and why it was delisted please, it does not breach any of the rules, and was listed for a long period of time. It is also highly applicable to the category it was in, and a well known site in the field it covers.

response: No we cant tell you, it probably broke one of the rules

some standard rules given

ME: It didnt break any of the above, in fact some of the existing sites in that category are breaking those rules, and worse.

Response: We cant discuss individual sites, but thanks for the heads up about the other sites.

ME: Can you tell me when it was deleted at least?

Response: No, we cant discuss it, you site was deleted for breaking one of the rules, we are godlike and dont ever give you a reason.

ME: I repeat it was not in breach of any of those things, are you sure it was not deleted by mistake, or due to corruption?

Response: Corruption did not occur, we dont make mistakes, if you have evidence of corruption email it to blah blah.

ME: How can I have evidence of corruption when you fail to disclose any relavent facts?

Response: This thread is going nowhere, go away, thread closed.

That seems to be the most usual type of way its handled at the resource zone........

[joedolson]

Yes, that sounds like a characteristic discussion at ResourceZone.

I haven't been in there for years...but that still sounds VERY familiar.

I wouldn't waste your time with DMOZ at all. Submit and forget --- that's about all it's good for. (And half the time, I don't do the first part anymore.)

[gimmster]

Well,
I can't give a definitive answer as I can think of several reasons for a site being delisted (either temporarily or permanently), but whatever happened it was prior to the server crash last year, so I'd advise you to suggest it again.

Sites could be delisted for several reasons including, but not limited to, being offline or unreachable, having changed content and needing re-review, or category rationalisation where the site is moved to a new category and the editor does not have permissions to republish in the new location. Note that in any of these cases if it was unreviewed prior to the server crash, it was probably lost. Suggesting it again is not a problem.

[JohnMu]

When were you delisted? Maybe you just dropped out when they had the dataloss a while back. Do you know when you got in?

John

[Respree]

Ken, I would submit one more time. If you get in, you get in. If not, just move on an don't lose any sleep over it.

My situation was pretty much the same as yours three years ago. My RZ thread went pretty much how you described. They eventually closed the thread.

Guess, what -- I'm still here, and without their help...

[DianeV]

I'm not sure whether DMOZ still has the bot that checks whether sites they've listed still exist. If so, and if your server had a glitch last time it visited, then that could be another reason.

So, what Garrick said.

Edited by DianeV, 09 October 2007 - 04:03 AM.

[yannis]

To be honest, I wouldn't worry too much. I have two sites listed in DMOZ. I get one click from DMOZ every other month and their robot most probably visited three times in a year checking for links. Get one page on 'stumble' for a few days and you will gain more links and visitors than that.

Many people misunderstand the relationship between DMOZ and google. In the early days of google search engines needed a starting point. DMOZ provided that. If you were in DMOZ it never helped your SERPS or ranking. It only meant that Google could find you. Google's mirror of the DMOZ directory (duplicate content anyone?) never really fulfilled any particular role, but perhaps provided an in-house route for testing the starting of the journey of their bots. To-day this is probably unnecessary as Google has already a large database of uris' and this is more than adequate to kick-start googlebots' trips.

Yannis

[kensplace]

Im not sure when it was first listed, although it was a few years ago..

I will resubmit it sometime later, cant face a dmoz submission at the moment, just had to bury one of our dogs (old age, passed away yesterday in our arms after suddenly going totally blind then floppy).

Thanks for the advice...

[bragadocchio]

Sorry to hear about your dog, Ken.

[DianeV]

I'm sorry to hear it, too Ken. My wishes for you.

I had to go through something similar recently (old age, cat). It can be pretty tough.

[Jean_Manco]

Maybe if Jean Manco were around she'd have something to say about what might have happened.

Thanks for the vote of confidence, but I'm afraid Ken's vanished listing is a mystery akin to the Marie Celeste. We lost so much internal data in the Big Crash that there is no sign that your site was ever listed Ken, let alone what happened to it. My best guess is that was unreviewed by one of our automated tools for detecting dead links and then vanished from unreviewed with the crash.

What I can tell you for certain is that your site was not delisted by the current editor for the category, whose logs are available.

By all means resubmit, but I would point to this old post: Directories in the Doldrums which is just as true now. It's bad luck that you actually got in to that category early and now are gone.

On the plus side, I agree with Yannis that a listing in the ODP never carried the value that so many people imagined.

[kensplace]

Thanks,

A reply from someone at dmoz, there is hope for dmoz yet

Im curious when was the crash?

Just remembered the Internet archive, I had a look I was in dmoz in jan 2005, if not before, I was still in on this page

archive last update dec 2005

But disappeared on this page
may 2006 last update

So it was sometime between the end of 2005 and the end of may 2006 that it disappeared.

Have not had any long downtime (unless the dmoz spider takes a site out of dmoz for being down for a couple of hours or so) as I monitor the downtime and not had any emails of long downtime, and many sites that have had long periods of downtime, or are not even real sites anymore had no problems with being removed from what I can see....

ps - still waiting for a confirmation email to be sent from the resource zone, Im getting emails from other places, but the resource zone is still refusing to send one to me, or its getting lost somewhere....

[bragadocchio]

Hi Ken,

It looks like the DMOZ big crash happened sometime between October 2006, and January 2007.

I'm seeing comments in a few different places that the data dumps from DMOZ stopped around the second week of October, and didn't return until late January.

[kensplace]

Cheers, odd, looks like I disappeared before the crash then.

Just noticed I pasted the same link twice, in the earlier post, instead of the correct link which I no longer have handy.. ooops. Ah well, its on the Internet archive for then anyways

[Jean_Manco]

We just passed the anniversary of the Big Crash. Dmoz went down on 20 October 2006 and the editor server was not restored until 18 December 2006.

Bear in mind Ken that, in the absence of logs, I can only guess that your site was automatically unreviewed by our various link checkers. However I can say that they are not flawless. Robozilla only unreviews if it detects an error twice with an interval of a week or so between, but even so we find a percentage of the sites it delists are OK.

Robozilla might happen to arrive (twice!) on the rare occasions that a site is down for a few minutes. Or the site may be blocking Robozilla. And I dare say there are other possible reasons too technical for the likes of me to grasp why Robozilla may delist a working site. Under normal circumstance an editor should eventually get around to checking it. But the Big Crash swept away that possibility for many sites.

[kensplace]

Cheers for the reply,

I just resubmitted into the same cat, using the same title and same description as when it was previously in,
as taken from

waybackwhen lsblogs was in