What makes a Directory.........A Directory?

Phil

I've been checking out the whole Directory thing lately. And I think I understand the basic idea behind them.
What I've been wondering about is are there certain guidelines a site must follow to be considered a directory? What makes a directory more than a fancy glorified "Links" page? Can I just slap a list of sites up and call it a directory?
Now before anyone jumps to conclusions, the reason why I ask is because I actually considered doing something similar to a directory in a effort to get backlinks for my site, [URL="http://nosaintshistory.com"]http://nosaintshistory.com[/URL]. Now I see there is a whole system in place to achieve what I want. But how far do I need to go to actually make it a directory as opposed to a collection of football related sites?

peaceninja

I personally feel that a directory is always searchable. I think the internet is trending towards organizing 'nodes' of data by tagging it (del.icio.us and google use tags/labels). So you may want to include tags in whatever you ultimately implement. 'cuz it's trendy!

linexpert

In my opinion you need three things to have a successful directory. the things are as follows
1) you need alot of sites ( you can't call it a directory if you've got 15-20 sites and the users really don't have many choices)
2) you need the directory to be on top searchengines (google is the best place to be on if you're a web developer)
3) need the site to be updated frequently (the above will help get more members but to keep members you need to update if alot)