After a thorough read of the guidelines, I couldn't find a single thing that would exclude us. So I wrote back, asking for further explanation.
It turns out that we're the scourge of the Internet. A filthy, evil, insidious, disgusting dropshipper. You thought we were just a nice baked goods gift site, but no, we're unwashed pagans unworthy of entry into the sacred tower that is DMOZ, lest we sully it with our proscribed partnering ways that provide visibility to small bakeries that couldn't afford the online promotion on their own. Mere parasites feeding off the good fortunes of innocent bakers as we help their businesses grow.
All this time I thought my lack of cocktail party invitations was just an oversight on the part of busy friends. Now I wonder, do they know that I work for a dropshipper? Do they avoid me for fear that I might corrupt their children with promises of outstanding customer service and a 100% money back guarantee? Or do they fear that their own will power isn't enough to keep me from seducing them with unique products and one of the largest varieties of any bakery site on the Web?
And where is all this spelled out? The closest thing I could find to the obviously well-advised decision to exclude verminous dropshippers from DMOZ was this sentence in Editorial Guidelines, filed under the ominous heading, "Sites Not to Include:"
Sites devoted to the sales and distribution of a single product should be avoided if they are affiliate sites or if the site is merely a distributor for a manufacturer already listed in the Directory. The purpose of the ODP is not to replicate the individual listings of an online shopping catalog.
I don't see the word dropshipper in there, I suspect because DMOZ is afraid to write it. What I do see in the directory, however, are several sites that carry the exact same products that we sell, such as:
- Macy's--they sell the same cookies we carry
- ProFlowers--they also sell the same cookies
- Home Shopping Network--they sell the same cakes
- Cooking.com--let's say you're Delightful Deliveries, and you can't get listed in DMOZ because you're a dropshipper. You can always sell through a site that isn't a dropshipper, right? Right!
- Future Memories--who would ever think that this site was a dropshipper?
- Bunn Family Gourmet--we can't expect the Bunn Family to make everything they sell. After all, they need time for sleep and family dinners gathered around heaping plates of USDA Prime steaks
- efendos--or as I like to call them, "eFiendos." Not just a dropshipper, but a "FREE" shipping liar
My editor friend went on to tell me that carrying unique products isn't enough. So it seems dropshippers need to be segregated from the rest of the online community, for the good of us all. I was told that I could file a complaint at the DMOZ Resource Zone, but I don't want to ruin someone else's DMOZ good time, and I find something unsettling about DMZ and Zone in the same sentence.
DMOZ is a private entity, and they're free to run the directory any way they want. That's their right, and I support it. Getting as much as they have out of a group of volunteer editors is commendable, but a little more vigilance across the enterprise would leave me far more gruntled.
The bigger issue is the decision by search engines to rely on outside sources to do their work for them. I can understand anyone not wanting a bunch of editors and writers hanging around the office--we're a general nuisance, and we take all the free food.
But by outsourcing, what should be a level playing field is skewed in favor of those with the money and the influence to get coverage from DMOZ, CNN, Associated Press, and the other "expert" sources. Small businesses face enough of this oppression in the brick-and-mortar world; we don't need it carried on to the Web.
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