Despite the claims that ODP is a human edited directory, that’s not quite true. Today we expose a secret employee.

Robozilla is a webcrawler that periodically visits all the websites pointed to by the Open Directory Project. When a page has either moved or is not found, Robozilla notes this fact in the internal logs. Robozilla is a key to quality control, he occasionly runs wildly through the directory striking fear into editors as he creates the dreaded Robo-reds - sites considered to be out of commission for one reason or another. All these sites get unreviewed, to await a truly human editor to ensure that he was correct. Site that are working get returned to the directory. Sites that are dead, await an editor to try and find a replacment site - somtimes a URL has changed slightly and the web designer was too lazy to leave in place some redirects. Often the site was just down at the time the Robozilla checked it, sometimes no replacement can be found and the URL gets deleted.

An article from the DMOZ Editor Newsletter (dated 2000) When Robozilla Roaaarrs!

Robozilla’s editor profile

First this really is not about online poker, but about all the online poker spam bots that are attacking this site (and many. many other blogs) and trying to post comment spam. I’m following the advice in Bloggers of the World : Unite ! which suggests getting as many links as possible pointing to a neutral poker site, thus reducing the effectiveness of the spammers in getting PR.

So here’s another link to Online Poker (as well there is one in the sidebar)

To make this an ODP post - here is Games: Gambling: Poker

(MYTH and totally incorrect)

From Virtual Promote (Jim’s World) forums

In fact, sites which are listed in DMOZ automatically obtain a PageRank of 3/10 once listed in DMOZ

The poster then says … Of course, I can’t prove that now … and of course he never will since he’s posting random drivel and if had I wanted that I would have gone to Random Drivel, not an SEO forum

The proper way to get a site into the ODP heap, with the hopes to get it reviewed and listed is to manually choose the correct category and suggest the site using the suggest URL link. It is only by manual submission that a category can be correctly selected, it is only by manually writing up a description and title that you can increase the chances of catching the eye of an editor.

How to suggest a site to the Open Directory specifically states Auto-submission software is (and always has been) a violation of this procedure. Sites submitted automatically are flagged and deleted after the submission is accepted, without notification to you

Auto-submission software and/or site submission services are generally inexpensive options that allow you to submit your site to twenty search engines, to even to 247,589 search engines. We can wonder why anyone would believe there are that many places to submit, and can question whether these services offer any value for the money, but for the most part, a service that submits your site to Google or Yahoo is not going to do your site any harm.

However SEO services that submit your site to DMOZ, can cause great problems. Many of those who offer submission services are clueless, and will use shotgun approaches. Not only will the site go the wrong category, it may well be submitted on a monthly basis, or to multiple categories. There are several SEO sites that continue to suggest that repetitive submission is required until your site is listed.

Most of these submission services (or programs) simply take your URL and throw it at all known search engines together with a canned description. For the price they charge, good luck at any quality. Be thankfull if they even get you correct spellings.

Heed the warning on the DMOZ submit page, auto-submission of sites can result in banning and blocking of your site.

People sometimes wonder why anyone becomes an editor - why would anyone waste their life reviewing and listing websites and not get paid for it. The general assumption is that most people become editors to get their sites listed but that seems to be incorrect. I don’t know of any reliable measure of the different reasons, but here are some.

Someone may have a particular interest in a particular topic and have already collected sites related to that topic. Being an editor allows them to put that list into the public domain, and continue to develop the list. They apply for the most appropriate category, and perhaps later apply for additional categories.

Some people have varied interests and like the concept of contributing to the public good. They like looking at varied sites, reviewing them and listing them.

There are those that just like the general idea of organizing and categorizing topics. These type of people often become librarians and indexers, and they may do that as a full time job. Being an ODP editor, just extends that ability and interest.

Some only have part time jobs, or are retired, and being an ODP editor is a hobby that stretches the mind. It beats being glued to the TV watching mindless media.

Some people do want to get their site listed, they are not professional SEOs or webmasters, they just have one site for their business, and want to get it listed. So that’s fine, provided they are even-handed and also list competing businesses. They have no interest beyond that single category. Note, that it is not that common, and that a large number of ODP editors do not even have a web site.

It is not uncommon for someone to apply in order to get their site listed, but find out they enjoy ODP editing, and continue on to ask for additional categories and do extensive editing of sites in many categories.

There are of course those who join with ulterior motives, they want to manipulate ODP to their advantage. They join, edit correctly for a while, then start to try and sneak in mirror sites, or tweak descriptions with keywords.But it’s not that easy, an editor starts with one small category and has to work their way up to get additional areas to edit. There are also cross-checks and balances, any editor can see what any other editor has done, and eventually someone will notice.

It started a week ago, when I took a look at State Forecast for Louisiana - At that time the site said :-

EXTREMELY DANGEROUS HURRICANE KATRINA CONTINUES TO APPROACH THE
MISSISSIPPI RIVER DELTA

DEVASTATING DAMAGE EXPECTED

MOST OF THE AREA WILL BE UNINHABITABLE FOR WEEKS…PERHAPS LONGER. AT
LEAST ONE HALF OF WELL CONSTRUCTED HOMES WILL HAVE ROOF AND WALL
FAILURE. ALL GABLED ROOFS WILL FAIL…LEAVING THOSE HOMES SEVERELY
DAMAGED OR DESTROYED

and continued with many more dire consequences. I had to check and cross check to make sure it was not a hoax. When Katrina flattened out and appeared to do minimal damage, several who I had forwarded the report to made fun of me for believing it.

I do some part time for a company where I monitor news reports, and then I got another report that two levees had broken. At that time no-one was reporting the item, so I hesitated to let anyone know. In retrospect, it was true, and it led to the first item being correct.

ODP editors were monitoring the situation, some very close to the disaster, and by last Wednesday had created

Science: Earth Sciences: Meteorology: Weather Phenomena: Hurricanes: Past Hurricanes: Hurricane Katrina as a new category to provide resources.

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