How To Build An Archival Quality Aricle Directory?

"The pen is mightier than the sword" said Cardinal Richelieu some 160 years ago. He could not have imagined how true this may turn out to be. Years ago only the very fortunate had the privilege to write for fun or to make a living. Nowadays, however, thanks to blogging platforms and article directories, anyone can tell a story and receive responses from around the world. For example, if you really wanted to know what went down in Vietnam, you had to travel all the way to Bangkok and talk to a complete stranger in a bar frequented by foreigners. The GI who never left Asia can now tell his story and initiate a dialogue with anyone who has access to the Internet.

What started out to be fun and entertaining has turned into something else. Thumbing through the directories and the author profiles, one notices something strange: there are way too many articles (there are authors who churn out a thousand or so a year) and their content looks awfully familiar. This begs at least two questions. The first, is there a unique content in these articles that cannot be found elsewhere via Google, Bing or Wikipedia? The second, when people need information where do they look: search engines such as Google, article directories and online knowledge bases such as Wikipedia? The fact is, commercial interest has discovered article directories and flooded servers with (perhaps well written but otherwise) useless content.

Let us see if we can kick this up by a couple of notches. Here is what I am proposing:

Research. Before you even attempt to write anything, do your research to see if the content is already well covered elsewhere. In the past research tools were available for academics only, but today, thanks to search technologies and Wikis, free and powerful tools are abundant.

References. If the content turns out to be worthy, then the author would be required to list 5-10 relevant sources where similar work has been published before. These references must be cited inside the paper and explanation must be given as to how the current article is different from the existing body of knowledge.

Review. Every article should be reviewed by several reviewers or Editors to evaluate its presentation as well as its content. The presentation should be checked for grammar and the content should be verified for novelty. Presently uniqueness is checked via Copyscape, however, it only checks for duplication i.e. an article that is well-spun may pass Copyscape, however, it may not have anything novel, i.e. it would not pass the Editor.

Revision. If the article pleases the Editors in both presentation as well as novelty, then a revision may be necessary based on their review comments. The revised article is then resubmitted and the process continues until it is ready for publication.

Archival. The emphasis should not be on publication but on archival. Archival quality articles have high impact which then generates authority as well as good visibility. What is the point publishing an article on how to register a domain name when there are already 71 million pages that cover the subject thoroughly?

The system above would eliminate a large percentage of submissions, but it would significantly elevate the prestige of the directory by paying respect to the God of three treasures: high quality, relevance and significant impact. Doing the same thing over and over again would not get you anywhere: ten or so good archival quality articles would generate more recognition than a thousand shallow ones whose content is better covered online.