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After much speculation we’ve decided to bite the bullet and join the masses that form the Twitter brigade. Whilst we’ve had a Twitter account for some time (follow us on Twitter here) we’ve deigned not to utilise it until now, instead concentrating on other communication mediums.

Rather than do this half-baked, we’ve actually taken some rather large development steps using the API to automate tweets from the IVS site whenever a new directory is included in the site.

We plan to use Twitter to communicate the following:

• Any new directories added to the IVS site via the Newly Added feed.
• Any directory list/excel updates
• Submission and advertising discounts and coupons
• Directory Industry news
• Updates to important threads on the IVS Directory Forum, such as the Web Directory FAQ

See you on Twitter!

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We’ve been working through the travel directories niche today. Taking some suggestions from the travel directories forum thread we’ve removed a handful of directories from the travel niche that were no longer online, are experiencing problems or who have converted to paid.

We’ve also added quite a few new directories to the list of over 30 free travel directories on the website in the time that the forum thread has been inactive (over 6 months). The 5 travel directory standouts on the list are:

Happy holidaying!

It’s been a long time since I last posted. Over 8 months in fact. The reason for this was that my time was fully occupied trying to complete the planning and building phases of the new Info Vilesilencer Directory List site.

Construction of the site began in late March, and was completed in August as quite a number of changes and reworks were done to get the foundation of the new site coded as per the specifications. In mid September the new site was launched, and despite not making a press release or an official announcement, the first month saw 420 members flock to the new space. Now, 4-and-a-half-months on we are 1912 members strong, and growing by the day as is the traffic which has moved in leaps and bounds.

The main reason that we haven’t done an “official re-launch” is because the site is largely still under-construction. Sure, the content is there, and you can do a lot more on the new list than you could on the old, however there is still a lot of functionality drawn up that hasn’t been completed. One of the main facilities that we are currently working on is a special paid membership module, that will give far greater access to the lists and special functions for a nominal yearly fee.

In the meantime, we are working through the popular niche directory categories adding more content, and expanding the sub-category structure.

Today we have added a number of new automotive directories as well as a new automotive category for racing directories.

I’ll make updates on the site, and new functionalities and anything else I can think of, on this blog. So stay tuned, as we have lots more to bring you this year.

DMOZ appears to have got with the times and installed their very own DMOZ blog.

If discussions concerning DMOZ on major forums like Digitalpoint are anything to go by, then this could be one of the stickiest blogs on the web, and one of the most heated. There is a lot of anti-DMOZ sentiment in the webmaster community, particulary pertaining to alleged corruption between editors and webmasters looking to “buy” their way into a DMOZ listing.

I think the blog is a brilliant idea to open the communication channels between DMOZ staff and the general populous and will improve the transparency of the directory and hopefully shed a spotlight on any corruption that does exist, and stamp it out.

DMOZ has been seen by many to be a dinosaur of a directory that is losing relevance. Through frequent activity of their blog the DMOZ team has the opportunity to demonstrate that this simply is not true, and get back to cataloguing and showcasing some of the best sites the web has to offer.