<p>Whiteboard Friday will live on! You will still see Rand's face there. And we'll continue to feature other guest hosts as well. :)</p>

<p>He still plans on being active in the community. It's a great passion of his. :) Expect to see his enthusiastic face on Whiteboard Fridays. :)</p>

<p>Thank you for taking the time to write up your thoughts! It means a lot to us! </p>

<p>I'm proud of the progress we have made in 2016. Big thank to Adam and the Moz Pro team!</p> <p>Thank you to everyone in the community who gave us feedback and helped us along the way. We really do listen to your needs and work to exceed your expectations. </p> <p>Here's to all the awesome new stuff on deck for 2017!<br /></p>

<p>Loved this article Joy! We run into these myths all the time in the industry. You do a great job collecting the most pervasive ones and dispelling them. </p> <p>We will be forwarding this to clients who get confused about where to focus their time, energy, and money. You're going to help a lot of people get bigger bang for their buck with this! </p> <p>Keep myth busting!<br /></p>

<p>Gosh yes! Moz was a blog before it was a company. Long may it reign! :) </p>

<p>The Moz community is very special and its a privilege to host it here at Moz. Undoubtedly there will be a few hiccups as we go through this transition in the next couple weeks, but we are committed to nurturing the Moz community. </p> <p>We may do fewer things, but we'll try and do the right ones really, really well. If you have any feedback in the weeks ahead about positive or negative impact to the community, please, please let us know. </p>

<p>Thank you Mark! We plan on collecting job opportunities we hear about and sending them to our Mozzers that are leaving. We''ll add you guys to the list! It's very important to me that these folks find great places to deploy their talents. </p>

<p>Thanks for the encouragement and support Teresa! </p>

<p>Transparency has no direct tie to sales, revenue, retention, profit or human resources. </p> <p>We do a lot of stuff that doesn't have a direct connection to money making. We do it because that's how we want to live and work. </p> <p>I believe, but cannot prove, that there is a significant halo effect from it that helps us with our business. But it's a leap of faith. </p> <p>There are many different ways to be successful at business and to live a happy life. TAGFEE works for me. </p>

<p>I miss David Bowie too. He's popping up everywhere for me. :( </p> <p>Felt compelled to include him here.</p>

<p>I want to live in a world where anyone can succeed regardless of what they look like. Similarly, I don't want to live in a world where people are penalized disproportionally based on what they look like. I'm hopeful that someday everyone will have equal opportunity to contribute and succeed. </p> <p>We have a long way to go before we get there. This is true for online marketing, and many other areas of life. But I'm not threatened by big, complex problems. I am invigorated by them. We have inherited the culture we live in, but we can also influence it for the better. </p> <p>I loved this post because it uses data to help us understand gender inequality in online marketing. It's heartening to see that in some areas we're doing pretty well (Yes, go Canada!). And I'm inspired to keep working hard in areas where there is still too great of a gap (technical and leadership roles). </p> <p>I heard Rev. Jesse Jackson say "We didn't know how good baseball could be until everyone could play." Amen. That's true for online marketing, and any role that is predominately dominated by a homogeneous group. We will not have social equity until we have opportunity equity. </p> <p>Thanks for the thoughtful post Jackie!</p>

<p>The personnel costs include health insurance, tuition reimbursement, coaching, paid paid vacation, and other benefits. We've increased these costs and have not increased the pace of hiring. In fact, 2012 was the most hiring we've ever done in a year. So, the numbers make sense because we're paying more to support our workforce and did not increase headcount at the same rate.</p> <p>We've got a ton of open jobs now though. So I expect that recruiting number will jump up in 2015. :) </p>

<p>Not very concerned. </p> <p>It's important to remember that EVERYONE is struggling to recruit engineers. This is a universal experience for anyone trying to build software, especially at scale and working with big data. We store and process hundreds of Terabytes of data and are moving to the multi Petabyte range. The number of people that have experience with the scale and complexity of our products, and the size of our data sets, is pretty limited. Everyone has the same challenge we do. </p> <p>While we have one subscription product today, it's actually made of up of smaller applications (followerwonk, OSE, Q&amp;A, Moz Analytics etc), and we've got more applications on the way. :) </p> <p>Yes we have challenges; We also have big opportunities. I believe in the Moz team and in the strength and growth of the wider digital marketing market. We will be successful, but certainly not without encountering and overcoming many challenges along the way. And that's okay. It keeps us learning and growing. </p> <p>So, I'm not 'concerned' in a significant way. I am invigorated. In the immortal words of 30 Rock's Jack Donaghy, "Business doesn't get me down, it gets me off." :) </p> <p>If you're looking for easy money, I do not recommend VC-backed startup in a dynamic market. :) </p>

<p><a href="http://moz.com/about/jobs" rel="nofollow">We're hiring.</a> :) </p> <p>Paid Paid FTW! </p> <p>Seriously, we take care of the (1) the people, (2) the product, and (3) the profits, in that order. </p>

<p>Hi Carla, we have a graph of organic traffic growth on the <a href="https://infogr.am/mozs_2014_year_in_review" rel="nofollow">Moz 2014 infographic</a>, but not in the post. Is that what you're looking for?</p>

<p>It's not a secret. :) </p> <p>I talked about our move from public to private cloud in <a href="http://moz.com/blog/mozs-2013-year-in-review" rel="nofollow">last year's annual report</a>. You can read more about the <a href="https://moz.com/devblog/tco-the-nerds-lob/" rel="nofollow">technical details on our dev blog</a>.</p>

<p>We're on target for our Q1 goals, with the exception of cash and operating expenses. We actually didn't spend as much as planned, so we have more cash than we thought we'd have. </p> <p>For most people, this would be good news. :) </p> <p>It's actually kind of a bummer. We didn't hire as many engineers as we hoped. It's great that we're saving money, but I'd much rather be executing faster on strategies. We've got some product ideas and improvements in the pipeline that we need more help building.</p> <p><strong>Please, please, please send us your most amazing technical talent so that we can make more great stuff for the community! </strong></p> <p>Regarding 2015 forecast, we do an annual budget that the board approves each year. That's good governance. However, it's not really what we use to operate the business. We have a rolling forecast that we update regularly based on conditions on the ground. That's what we use to operate the business. In general, we're hoping to grow between 25%-35% this year. We're also planning on spending more to fuel 2016 growth (mostly engineering headcount). We're aiming to keep our cash burn around 10% of revenue. Hope this helps!</p>

<p>Donated! </p> <p>We're thinking about you Dana and behind you 100%! </p>

<p>The Moz community team is the best in the world. I know, I know... I'm biased.  :)</p> <p>They are the best in the world not because of their physical characteristics. They are the best because of the strength, passions, and values of the community they foster. That community is TAGFEE.  </p> <p>The Moz community is a collection of people working to create a world that evaluates people by the impact they have, and not on their physical characteristics, economic status, or personal belief systems.I'm proud to have a culture and a team that is feminist and TAGFEE. </p> <p>And today, like everyday, I'm proud of my community management team. Keep rockin! </p>

<p>We think about you all the time Dana!  Just because you're focusing on other stuff right now doesn't mean you lose your mozzer status! You're a mozzer now and forever! xoxo </p>

<p>Thank you for your continued support of TAGFEE and for helping us build that community of excellence, sharing and growth. I love how you phrased that! </p>

<p>The <strong>first </strong>Developer's Cheat Sheet!  Danny, you're another great example of someone who brought us all along on your journey to be the best internet marketer you could be. I'm so proud of how far you've come, and grateful for everything you've done for Moz. xo</p>

<p>I feel ya! Meeting Rand changed my career too!  I'm doing what I love, and I wouldn't have found that without Rand and this community. </p>

<p>Thank you for bringing your experience, generosity, and humor to the moz community for this long.  You're one of the brightest lights in our Moz sky.  Thanks for the inspiration and the laughs Dr. Pete!</p>

<p>That's wonderful! I love that this is a place you can come to be supported, inspired, and pushed to meet your potential. We're all getting better together. :)  Keep it up! </p>

<p>Thank you for all of your contributions Gianluca. There would be no community without people like you bringing their passion and ideas. hugs!</p>

<p>Looks like we've got a live one here! Lots of interesting discussion today. I wanted to share a couple reactions/thoughts. </p> <p>1. Moz will always foster a culture that is inclusive and TAGFEE. There are a lot of people at Moz working to create a world that evaluates people by the impact they have, and not on their physical characteristics, economic status, or personal belief systems. Sometimes, we blog about it, like now. :)  Most of the time we don't. </p> <p>2. Actively working to create a more inclusive world isn't the same as putting down another group. It's not a zero sum game. It is not male gender vs female gender. I love Erica's post because it didn't try to state a Universal Truth and it didn't accuse people of bad intent. I sincerely hope that is not the message that was heard in this post. I know that's not Erica's intent and it's not what Moz is about. Everyone I know in SEO and tech is trying to do the right thing and wants to help. I love it!</p> <p>This post IS about raising awareness about the impact of our small, subconscious actions. It helps us ask great questions as marketers and humans: Do we understand the socio-cultural factors that impact the language we use and the images we select? Do we understand the impact they have on others? <strong>Who are we leaving out, without meaning to? </strong>We have choices to make. To what extent do we operate within and exploit (and therefore perpetuate) popular stereotypes and trends because "they work" (i.e., genderizing toys sells more toys)? When and to what extent do we take a chance and think more subtly about the human experience? We talk about culture as monolithic, but it is always a collection of unique individuals. What is our responsibility for creating culture? We inherit it, but we also influence it. </p> <p>3. Not everyone's experience is the same. We are all working in different contexts around the world. For some, this post is timely and impactful. For others, it's not that meaningful; they are already doing these things and living in a relatively bias free environment. The diversity of human experience is what this post is about so let's celebrate that!  Not every post is going to speak to everyone at the time it's published.  If this one isn't for you, don't worry! There will be another post tomorrow. Thanks for stopping by and reading this far. :)</p>

<p> I've got to agree with you that our help team is top notch. They genuinely care about our community and providing real value to customers. They want to do the right thing for the customer, not just the company. That makes them the best. :) </p>

<p> You're on the right track. The 25k subscribers includes a lot of folks in free trial who aren't paying customers yet. When you exclude those, you're looking at dividing revenue by 21,216 paying subscribers instead. That's a fast and dirty way to get to $1,338.61 per subscriber. </p> <p> This is still a pretty naive metric. It would probably be better to take an average of subscribers of the year. </p> <p> Internally, we focus more on the monthly ARPU (average revenue per user). As customers move to higher tiers, our ARPU climbs. </p>

<p> We were all hoping for better results in 2013. A lot of good stuff happened, but there was also some major misses. We're disappointed, but moving on. I learned a long time ago that in order to live a happy life you need to forgive yourself and others. Take the learning and move on. </p> <p> Regarding issuing a grade or something for the year...Life is complicated, and I find it really challenging to sum up all of our activities with one grade. I'm also not sure it's useful for the team. I'm very interested in learning what went wrong in 2013, but not as interested in assigning a grade to it all. </p> <p> That said, we're working very hard to instigate OKRs right now. That's all about objectively measuring your success in specific activities. That will help us drive accountability and transparency throughout the organization. </p>

<p> Thanks for hanging in there on the post! Our expenses are definitely high. We'll be slowing down hiring and ending our champagne and caviar parties for a while. </p> <p> Just kidding. We'll NEVER give up our champagne and caviar parties. </p> <p> okay. Just kidding for reals. We're more of a wine, whiskey and cupcakes party company. </p>

<p> Hi Larry, We're actually in the middle of an epic office move so most of our stuff is in boxes. We felt it was a fitting backdrop since this really is a time of transition. Plus, we like to keep it real. ;) </p>

<p> Nikola, Thank you for welcoming me. I agree that there is a little bit of a 'bitter sweet' taste to this evolution in our roles. I appreciate your support. </p> <p> Cheers! </p>

<p> That could be arranged Phil. </p> <p> Just kidding Will! Sort of, anyway. ;) </p>

<p> ALL YOUR WHITE BOARD FRIDAYS ARE BELONG TO ME!!!!! </p>

<p> Don't I know it! I'm just glad I don't have to grow such a magnificient beard! </p>

<p> Danny, </p> <p> I would appreciate the opportunity to learn more about your experience when you hit 'Request a Feature' and what went wrong with the Help Hub. </p> <p> Would you mind giving me more details? I want those channels to work for you and I'm disappointed you had a bad experience. Please email me personally at Sarah at Moz.com. </p> <p> Thanks! </p>

<p>Thanks for bringing up the old <a href="http://www.seomoz.org/blog/the-anatomy-of-a-ripoff-report-lawsuit" rel="nofollow">lawsuit</a> Rand! That's not a sore subject at all. ;)  Ha!</p>

<p>Thanks Rick! Ps., I'm hoping to try out the Inn at Little Washington next week! I'll never forget our convo about it! hugs!</p>

<p>Big Hugs Cyrus!&nbsp;</p>

<p>Thanks so much! It's been great having your support on this journey!</p>

<p>Thanks for sticking with us Jonathan! cheers!</p>

<p>Thanks Thomas! I'm pumped. What an exciting two years ahead!&nbsp;</p>

<p>Hi Sandiegoseo,</p> <p>I'm the chief operations officer at SEOmoz. I'm responsible for our billing and legal departments.&nbsp;</p> <p>I'm sorry you're frustrated about our policy of not doing special custom contracts for PRO and PRO Plus accounts. The reason we can offer such an affordable tool is that there are very low transactions costs. Lawyers cost money. Often the terms that they impose also require money (for example, insurance provisions).&nbsp;</p> <p>We would LOVE to have your business. I <em>wish</em> it was economical for SEOmoz to have a custom relationship with every customer. Unfortunately, that's just not an effective way to build an affordable, scalable product.</p> <p>Thanks for the feedback. I hope we can find a way to serve you in the future.</p> <p>Respectfully,</p> <p>Sarah&nbsp;</p>

<p>Hi Eryck,</p> <p>You should also check out our <a href="http://seomoz.zendesk.com/entries/345964-linkscape-update-schedule" rel="nofollow">Linkscape Update Calendar</a>. It doesn't do much to predict the future, but sometimes seeing the frequency of past updates helps give you an idea of what we're capable of. :)&nbsp;</p> <p>Hope this helps!</p>

<p>Richard,</p> <p>Thanks so much for breaking this down. Sounds like an interesting leap forward in search. :) &nbsp;</p>

<p>Tom,</p> <p>Thanks so much for sharing this! What a great resource for our MozAPIers! I've added your post our our <a href="http://seomoz.zendesk.com/entries/20088262-distilled-and-conversation-marketing-team-up-to-combine-seomoz-api-and-google-spreadsheets" rel="nofollow">API Announcement </a>about Ian and Tom's previous work.&nbsp;</p> <p>You've created a wonderful resource for all of us. I look forward to seeing your other contributions.&nbsp;</p> <p>Thought I would also share a few useful resources for folks.</p> <p>Check out our <a href="http://seomoz.zendesk.com/forums/293196-developer-discussion-group" rel="nofollow">API Dev Forum.</a></p> <p>We also have an <a href="http://seomoz.zendesk.com/forums/293216-seomoz-app-gallery" rel="nofollow">App Gallery</a> featuring nifty products that use the API. You might like the <a href="http://seomoz.zendesk.com/entries/20053482-excel-interface-to-the-seomoz-free-api-from-businesshut-com" rel="nofollow">Excel Integration</a> or the <a href="http://seomoz.zendesk.com/entries/334612-seomoz-wordpress-plugin" rel="nofollow">SEOmoz&nbsp;</a><a href="http://seomoz.zendesk.com/entries/334612-seomoz-wordpress-plugin" rel="nofollow">Word Press plugin</a> too!&nbsp;</p> <p>Keep up the great work guys!</p>

<p>Great job guys! You're kicking butt in the Help Desk forum, and it's great to see you in prime time. :)</p> <p>Also. Snowflake sweaters are okay, but I'd love to see Aaron rock the <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypn436DFTUQ" rel="nofollow">gem sweater</a> next time.&nbsp;</p>

<p>Such a great post!&nbsp;</p> <p>I'm going to use this to help educate some of our new-to-seo team members! Will also use it when we get questions about url structure through our help channels! Especially numbers 4 through 10. &nbsp;:)</p> <p>Thanks Paul!&nbsp;</p>

<p>Danny, Danny, Danny... I'll miss you big time. You've brought so much fun to SEOmoz. I think you introduced me to 80% of my favorite youtube vids. And Champagne Wednesday is an institution! We'll be forever in your debt for that one. And the pie-eating contest!</p> <p>Thank you for the laughs and the inspiration.&nbsp;</p> <p>I hope you won't be a stranger! Come back and say hi to us whenever your travels bring you back home.</p> <p>hugs!</p>

<p>We made a communication mistake. Only customers of the Site Intelligence API have access to Top pages data at this time.&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;The Site Intelligence API is a completely separate product from PRO (except at the Premier level). Thus, even if you&#39;re a PRO member, you won&#39;t see Top Pages information in the wordpress Plugin. &nbsp;</p><p>Sorry for the complete communication fail there. &nbsp;:( &nbsp;</p>

<p>Hm. Double check that there are no spaces in your API keys. That's got a couple other people screwed up.&nbsp;</p> <p>:)</p>

<p>Double check to make sure you don't have spaces in your API key. :) &nbsp;That was someone else's issue. Once they got rid of the spaces, everything was A-0kay!&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p>

<p>Great questions!&nbsp;</p> <p>You get up to 1 million rows of data each month per API key. So if you're using the same API for each account, you'll reach your limits sooner.&nbsp;</p> <p>When you hit your limit, you won't be automatically charged, but we will suspend your access.&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>If you like what you see and you want even more data, you should think about becoming a Site Intelligence API customer. There are no limits and you can get a lot more data. &nbsp;:)&nbsp;</p> <p>Thanks for your excellent questions!</p>

<p>Ha! Great idea! &nbsp;We would love for someone to build this off of our API. :) &nbsp;Any takers out there???</p>

<p>Thanks for such a great post Dana!</p>

So thrilled to have you on board Joanna. I feel really lucky to have you here!

<p>Hey guys, </p><p>These are great questions! I wanted to quickly try and clear up a couple things.&nbsp; First, the same standards about endorsements do apply to other media, including radio and television.&nbsp; If an advertiser is paying you to endorse something, then you must disclose it--UNLESS it is obvious from the context that it is a paid endorsement.&nbsp; That is why they don&#39;t need to put a disclaimer on a commercial showing TigerWoods using a particular golf ball--It&#39;s obvious that he&#39;s being paid to do that. He didn&#39;t just wake up and decide to take time out of his Pro golf schedule to promote a particular golf ball. So, the FTC is actually trying to adapt the laws that have goverened other media to online media with these new guidelines.&nbsp;</p><p>The issue of product placement has been percolating at the FTC for a long time. As far as I know, there are currently no regulations governing product placement. There&#39;s a line somewhere between Sally Field driving a particular kind of car in a movie and Tiger Woods using a golf ball on a commercial... But where the exact location of that line is not always clear. The FTC examines many factors, including context (is this a commerical or a movie?), is a product being actively or passively promoted?? Does the FTC need to protect consumers from product placement the same way it needs to protect people from seeded comments in a blog post? </p><p>I really don&#39;t think this is a case of the FTC treating online advertisers differently. It&#39;s closer to the truth to say that the FTC is trying to treat online advertising more like traditional advertising.&nbsp; But the boundaries of permissable are not always clearly defined, and trying to translate general guidelines from one medium to another creates even more uncertainty... at least in the short term!&nbsp;</p><p>Thanks for your comments!&nbsp; </p>

I don&#39;t know of any legal leverage to stop a site from linking to you. I&#39;ve seen plaintiffs (wrongly or rightly) assert that given the context, the link is a trademark infringement and/or false advertising and/or copyright infringement. All of these cases are brought by brand holders who argue that the linking site is misrepresenting or exploiting their brand or content in some way.<p>I don&#39;t know of any legal rule that can stop a site from linking to you if there aren&#39;t trademark or false advertising or perhaps defamation claims also present on the linking site.&nbsp; </p><p>Generally, I think the lack of regulation about who can link to who is one of the best things about the internet! I&#39;m all for the unhindered spread of information. However, in this case, it certainly seems unfair that you cannot prevent a spammy site from linking to you if they aren&#39;t abusing your brand, copyright or reputation in some legally cognizable way.&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;You can write a cease and desist letter and hope it gets some traction, but in the end, I don&#39;t think you could follow-up your letter with a winable lawsuit. I suspect we&#39;ll continue to see more litigation on this topic in the future.&nbsp; </p><p>&nbsp;Best of Luck! </p><p>&nbsp; </p>

<p>It&#39;s a huge topic and the law is still developing. </p><p>I wrote a <a href="international-copyright-on-the-web-what-rules-apply-to-me-and-what-court-will-apply-them-" rel="nofollow">blog post</a> about a year ago that talks about sticky jurisdiction issues when dealing with internet cases. </p><p>In the blog post, I use the example of a copyright case involving international parties, but many of the same questions would be asked in other kinds of cases involving the internate and parties from different countries.</p><p>I hope it helps!</p><p>Thanks for your question! </p><p>&nbsp;</p>

<p>It&#39;s true that non-provable opinions, like &quot;We&#39;re the best SEO company in the world!&quot; are considered &quot;puffery&quot; and are not actionable. </p><p>However, promises based in &quot;facts,&quot; are considered warranties and are actionable. Thus, if you promise increased sales within 60-90 days, you better deliver increased sales.</p><p>&nbsp;The line between &quot;puffery&quot; and &quot;promise&quot; is sometimes hard to distinguish. The courts often look at the overall context of the remark as well.&nbsp;</p><p>Thus, while a comment like &quot;You won&#39;t be able to handle it!&quot; may not be actionable if it was a question of whether visible.net created as many sales as they promised. However, if Visible did not increase sales at all, then the remark looks more actionable. </p><p>&nbsp;Another example in the complaint involves the defendants&#39; claims about customer service. The defendants allegedly claimed to have &quot;The best customer service.&quot; That is probably not actionable. However, their other claim that that provide a dedicated customer server specialist to your account who is available any time, probably is actionable.&nbsp; </p><p>&nbsp;Really interesting issues. We&#39;ll have to see how the case develops! &nbsp;</p><p>Thanks for your comment!&nbsp;</p>

<p>Credit packages are coming soon!&nbsp; I promise. We&#39;re just working out the final details.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Thanks Nicknick!&nbsp;</p>

<p>doh! spell check auto correct. </p><p>Thanks for the correction Burgo!&nbsp;</p>

<p>I&#39;m no UK law expert, but I would be very surprised if such clauses were not favored in the UK, Canada and Australia. All three countries are based on the same common law system that tends to respect privately contracted rights, so long as they aren&#39;t manifestly unfair in a significant way.</p><p>The &#39;opportunity to cure clause&#39; is generally favored by courts because it is such a common sense way to encourage the resolution of disputes outside of court. &nbsp;</p><p>Also, I have a vague memory of negotiating a contract with a UK party in which they included such a clause.</p><p>Hope this helps!&nbsp;</p>

<p>It offers some protection, but it&#39;s not full proof. Here&#39;s what I mean. </p><p>Let&#39;s assume you do the work according to the deliverables described in the contract. Then you invoice the client and he refuses to pay and accuses you of not delivering what she wanted.&nbsp;</p><p>You can tell her that she is required to give you notice and opportunity to fix it before she can withhold payment. Otherwise, you have the right to sue her and she cannot use the &quot;defective services&quot; as a counter-claim against you. She is required to give you the chance to fix it before withholding payment. </p><p>Here&#39;s the rub though: For true &#39;deadbeat&#39; clients, these kinds of threats aren&#39;t going to inspire her to pay you. She would rather wait until you sue her or a collection agency starts in after her. Thus, if you&#39;re not willing to go to Court and collect the money through legal proceedings, this it may not be that useful for collection purposes. Most of the time, it&#39;s not worth going to court over collection issues. It has to be a pretty sizeable debt to make it worth it.&nbsp;</p><p>If you did bring this &#39;deadbeat&#39; client to court, then having such a clause would definitely help you. It just so seldom worth the expense of court. </p><p>Having a provision for attorneys&#39; fees in your contract will help make using the legal system for collections worth it.</p><p>Thanks for your question!&nbsp;</p>

<p>That&#39;s the good news. You&#39;re not obligated to fix it. You&#39;re only entitled to the opportunity to fix it. </p><p>Obviously, sometimes you&#39;re not going to be able to please a client. Maybe what they want is impossible or unethical. This gives you the chance to make the customer happy, but not the obligation. </p><p>Thanks for your comment!&nbsp;</p>

<p>That&#39;s a great point David. </p><p>In our contract, we have a separate section on just &quot;Notices.&quot; It requires all notices to be written and sent to very specific addresses. &nbsp;</p><p>More detail is better. </p><p>Thanks for pointing that out.&nbsp;</p>

<p>I have thoughts, but they probably aren&#39;t comforting!&nbsp; ;)</p><p>Unfortunately, the protections you&#39;re able to include in your contract will vary greatly according to your bargaining power. If you have more clients than you can take and you don&#39;t need the contract, then you can have a more consultant-friendly (i.e., more warranty disclaimers, more indemnifications etc etc) contract. If you need the work and can&#39;t afford to let the client go, then you&#39;re going to have to accept more of the risk.&nbsp;</p><p>It also varies greatly according to clients. Some big clients refuse will refuse to indemnify you and will want very narrowly tailored disclaimers. Small mom-and-pop shops will probably read the contract without signing. </p><p>There are a lot of variables in negotiating a contract and the right balance. In the end, the party with the stronger bargaining power will probably end up shifting most of the risk of loss onto the party with the weaker bargaining power. &nbsp;</p><p>I do have some pieces of advice: Always be honest and try to write in plain language where possible. Only use legalese where necessary. Don&#39;t bury important terms. They might not be enforceable if you do. </p><p>Great question GMC!&nbsp;</p>

Great tip PB!&nbsp; I should probably do a post on insurance issues.... terrific idea!

<p>Google&#39;s risk of liability comes from listing the offending site in its SERPs. Google doesn&#39;t have any control over taking down or putting up a site, but it does have control over what it lists in its results pages.</p><p>The legal argument is that Google is contributory liable for copyright infringement if it directs people to pages that infringe copyright. The DMCA actually protects services like Google from claims of copyright infringement by making it so they can&#39;t be sued for contributory infringement if they follow the DMCA&#39;s take-down procedures.</p><p>The DMCA is supposed to make it easier to run a search engine, while still protecting people&#39;s copyright. </p><p>Thanks for your comment! </p>

<p>Thanks for your question TTAM.</p><p>If you send a counter-notification, nothing happens. At the notice-counter-notice stage the process is really quick and informal. No judge. No penalties. Just letters with direction to either take-down or put-back.&nbsp; </p><p>However, <strong>if a lawsuit is started</strong> (by you or the original complainer) there are severe financial penalties for filing a bogus DMCA take-down notice. Thus, if you&#39;re willing/have to go to court over the matter, the judge can penalize the bogus complainer.&nbsp;</p><p>Also, many Online Service Providers keep track of who is filing DMCA take-down notices and whether there are repeated put-back notices against a particular complainer. If the OSP sees a consistent pattern of abuse by a particular person, many of them will disregard all future complaints by that person. It is a little risky for the OSP to do that because it increases their risk of liability. Thus, the abuse usually has to blatant, serious, and consistent before an OSP would take that step.&nbsp;</p><p>I hope this helps answer your question.&nbsp; </p><p>Best, </p><p>Sarah&nbsp;</p>

<p>Another excellent question from the Willster.&nbsp;</p><p>I have to go back re-read the statute, but I asssume that you&#39;re only consenting to jurisdiction for purposes of a copyright infringement suit, not for any other claims.&nbsp;</p><p>I would be surprised if it was a broad and general consent to all claims. As far as I know, there haven&#39;t been any cases on this issue either. </p><p>Let me dig around and see if I can find a more definitive answer.&nbsp;</p><p>Great question Will! </p>

<p>At this point in time, Courts have unequivocably ruled that you do not have a right to rankings. Thus, you can&#39;t sue Google about your rankings.&nbsp; </p><p>I don&#39;t foresee any legal recourse for site owners ejected from Google&#39;s index now or in the near future. Maybe in the distant future... </p><p>There are other interesting debates circulating about ways that Google may be violating anti-trust laws. For example, several academic-types are arguing for privacy to be a factor in monopoly/anti-trust analysis. You have a right to privacy, and <a href="http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2007/10/privacy.html" rel="nofollow">Peter Swire</a> argues that consumers are harmed by the conglomeration of so much private information in one place. After <a href="the-evil-side-of-google-exploring-googles-user-data-collection" rel="nofollow">Danny Dover&#39;s post</a> on the information collected by Google, Swire&#39;s argument is increasingly appealing to me.&nbsp; </p><p>I&#39;m sure this wasn&#39;t the answer you were seeking, but I hope it&#39;s informative just the same.</p><p>Respectfuly,</p><p>Sarah Bird&nbsp;</p>

<p>In this case, the fact that Margae received commissions for both affiliate and SEO work isn&#39;t necessarily determinative because it is consistent with both parties&#39; version of the facts.</p><p>Clear Link argued that of course Margae received commission from the Clear Link properties because those properties were governed by the Partnership Agreement, just like all affiliate sites. In other words, Clear Link wanted the Court to treat the SEO work that Margae performed on the Clear Link sites like any other typical affiliate relationship.</p><p>Margae, on the other hand, argued that the partnership agrgreement was irrelevant to the SEO services provided for the Clear Link properties. Its commissions were based on an oral contract.&nbsp; </p><p>Everyone agrees that Margae should have received commission for both its own websites and the Clear Link websites. The question was whether the commission was owed because of the Partnership Agreement or some other verbal contract.</p><p>The stakes are high. If the partnership agreement controls, then Clear Link has termination rights and can argue it doesn&#39;t owe a terminated affiliate anything. On ther other hand, if the partnership agreement doesn&#39;t control, then Clear Link has a more difficult time justifying why it should be able to continue to use Margae&#39;s proprietary techniques without continuing to pay commissions. &nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;Hope this helps!</p>

<p>Hi Jim, </p><p>You can get a copy of the Complaint on the <a href="http://news.justia.com/cases/featured/illinois/ilndce/1:2007cv03371/210005/" rel="nofollow">Justia website</a>.&nbsp; </p><p>Good luck! </p>

<p>Sure. </p><p>For example, the plaintiffs claim in a recent document that the Defendants have &quot;used and monetized&quot; the following domains since November 2007 (after the suit was filed):</p><p>BlitzRealtyGrup.com</p><p>BoJacksonNude.com</p><p>BoJacksonSex.com</p><p>BoJacsonPorn.com</p><p>buyfishernuts.com </p><p>vulgangolf.com</p><p>vulcingolf.com</p><p>vulcenfolf.com</p><p>blitazrealtygrop.com</p><p>bojacksonsporn.com</p><p>vulkcangolf.com</p><p>bojacksonxxx.com</p><p>xxxojackson.com</p><p>bojacksonpics.com</p><p>(Looks like Mr. Jackson is a pretty popular guy...) </p><p>If you want even more information about the sites used and the alleged illegal acts, you can download the original complaint from the Justia site mentioned at the end of my post. But beware, it&#39;s a freakin gigantic pdf. </p><p>Best Regards,</p><p>Sarah </p>

holy smokes that&#39;s the best thing I&#39;ve heard in a week!

Fixed it. Thanks!

<p>UMMmmmmm....</p><p>This is very embarrassing. And quite hysterical. </p><p>When the sandwiches arrived with a receipt that said &quot;Darren,&quot; we assumed that they were FROM Darren, not FOR Darren.&nbsp;</p><p>Those of us not attending the conference that day were tremendously flattered by Darren&#39;s thoughtfulness and even used the incident as an excuse to crack open a bottle of Champagne.</p><p>The sandwiches were delicious and sparked up what had been a rather dull day at the office. </p><p>Many Many thanks Matt... and Darren.</p><p>Sorry for eating your sandwiches Darren!&nbsp; We owe you!</p>

<p>I think affiliate marketers are very anxious right now for the reasons you&#39;ve pointed out.</p><p>I think there is a good argument that the new law requires affiliates to disclose the fact that they get paid for referrals/clicks/conversions etc etc. The question, of course, is how much disclosure is enough?&nbsp;</p><p>You can bet a judge would look at this from an &#39;average consumer&#39; perspective, i.e., would the average consumer realize that this is a paid link or paid referall relationship? If the answer is &quot;yes,&quot; then you&#39;re probably okay. If the answer is &quot;no,&quot; then you could be afoul of the law. Most likely, an appropriate disclaimer would be in close proximity to the paid link.&nbsp; </p><p>At this point, we can only speculate how aggressive the government will be in prosecuting these cases.&nbsp;</p><p>I, for one, would be surprised if it aggressively went after paid links and affiliate marketers.&nbsp; But only time will tell.&nbsp; </p>

<p>I think that&#39;s a great point pbhj. </p><p>It will be interesting to see whether they raise the maximum fine. If they really want the law to have teeth, I think they&#39;ll have to.</p><p>Thanks for your comment! </p>

<p>Matt, </p><p>That&#39;s truly appalling. I don&#39;t even know what to say other than, &quot;Why on earth would someone go to such lengths for such a doomed enterprise?&quot; This secretive, destructive conduct increases my reservations about Gambert&#39;s character and motives.</p><p>I&#39;m very sorry that you have to go through this. I know that you have been merely sticking up for what you believe is right. Please let me know if I can be of any assistance.&nbsp;</p><p>Thank you for sharing your story. And thank you to VanDeMar for lending his expertise! </p><p>Let&#39;s get in touch tomorrow. </p><p>&nbsp;</p>

<p>sorry!! Fixed now.</p><p>: )&nbsp;</p>

<p>I couldn&#39;t agree with you more that most of this post is not pertinent to whether he can get a trademark. Those reasons are covered in my Notice of Opposition.</p><p>The post covers what <em>he</em> wrote and my thoughts about <em>his arguments</em>.&nbsp;</p><p>As for your claim that &quot;he doesn&#39;t have to show he was the first to use the term or that others have not used it,&quot; that&#39;s partially true. There are many elements to a successful trademark registration. &quot;First use&quot; is only part of the analysis. </p><p>If you know of a law that permits someone to register a merely descriptive term like &quot;SEO,&quot; that has been in common, frequent use for well over a decade by people operating in his same market, I&#39;d be happy to hear about it.There are no &quot;acquired distinctiveness&quot; arguments to be made in a case like this...&nbsp; </p><p>I respectfully disagree whether this is &#39;an open and shut&#39; case. There are no decent claims here.&nbsp; </p>

<p>Who you calling fat?!</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>; )&nbsp;</p>

<p>Well BuddhaBen, I will always defer to the practitioning experts. If I am in error, I sincerely apologize. &nbsp;</p><p>My understanding, and I&#39;m happy to be corrected, is that in the grand scheme of influencing your <strong>ranking</strong> on SERPs (not in communicating to your readers/consumers!), that description and title tags don&#39;t provide a lot of value. The real power to influence your rankings comes from putting the right keywords in the body of your site, getting links to your site, among other things&nbsp;</p><p>My information about the relative impotentence of metatags to improve rankings comes from, among other things, <a href="http://searchenginewatch.com/showPage.html?page=2167931" rel="nofollow">this article</a> by Danny Sullivan.&nbsp;</p><p>Again, I never meant to imply that metatags weren&#39;t important for other reasons (getting conversions, educating your readers, finding/creating consumers etc etc). In fact, that was one of my criticisms of the <em>Standard Process</em> Court&#39;s opinion. It seemed to disregard the other important, <strong>non-ranking effects</strong> of metatags.&nbsp;</p><p>Lastly, I think it&#39;s great that we&#39;re having this debate about metatags in the context of my post. It goes to show you that how can we expect judges and lawyers to &quot;get it right&quot; if the practitioners don&#39;t agree? The technology continues to evolve, the secret algorithms continue to evolve, and the industry terms of art aren&#39;t clearly defined, further inhibiting productive conversation about the issues.&nbsp;</p><p>Thanks for your comment! &nbsp;</p>

<p>Rishil,</p><p>Way to really engage the material here. I&#39;m thrilled.&nbsp;</p><p>I think what you&#39;re struggling with is what a lot of people are struggling with. That is, no one appears to know what metatags were used in these cases. And if you don&#39;t know what technology was employed, the rulings surrounding those technologies are vague and create more confusion in the law than clarity.</p><p>As for the first case, <em>Axiom</em>, I agree that the likely candidates would be either title tags or description tags (or both). Something interesting left out entirely from the opinions is that SEs sometimes create their own descriptions and ignore meta description tags. Now, in the first case where we know that the trademarked term did not appear in the body of the website, it is highly unlikely that the SEs came up with a description that involves a term not in the body of the website. In the second case, though, where the trademarked term was discussed in the body of the website, it is possible that the SE substituted its own description. Regardless, the lack of precision in the rulings confuses judges, attorneys, and SEO/Ms.&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>As for the second case, <em>Standard Process</em>, I think the Court did something important, which is to acknowledge that metatags don&#39;t affect <em>rankings</em>, something previously misunderstood and unfortunately embodied in other cases. However, I completely agree with you that the fact that metatag content (at least for title and description tags) is used by search engines (at least to some extent) to create content for SERPs seems to get left out of the analysis. For accuracy, the discussion should include both the impact on rankings and the impact on what is displayed in the SERPs.&nbsp; </p><p><strong>CONFESSION:</strong> The Court in <em>Standard Process</em> is not as clueless as I <strong>inadvertently</strong> made him out to be. On this post I focused on comparing the different treatment of metatags. I left out the second court&#39;s discussion of &quot;the likelihood of confusion.&quot; This might address your concerns and the concerns of others who&#39;ve commented:</p><p>First, the <em>Standard Process </em>Court ruled that the particular use of metatags were not a &quot;use in commerce.&quot; Since it&#39;s not a use in commerce, there can be no infringement, as I described in the post. </p><p>BUT THEN, the Court went on to make a second point about the &quot;likelihood of confusion.&quot; It said that because this doctor is actually selling the trademarked goods in question (the real things, not knock-offs), there would be no likelihood of confusion in this case anyway. In other words, even if the metatags made the trademark terms visible to the consumer, that&#39;s okay because the website actually delivers what it is promised, i.e., the trademarked goods. </p><p>Now this secondary ruling about the likelihood of confusion isn&#39;t binding on other courts. It&#39;s what fancy-schmancy lawyers call, <a href="http://legal-dictionary.tfd.com/dicta" rel="nofollow">dicta</a>. In other words, since the Court made his decision based on other factors (not a use in commerce), the rest of the arguments (no likelihood of confusion) are not necessary and therefore not binding. Judges often include dicta to hint to lawyers that it&#39;s not worth appealing this issue because It would make the same decision based on other criteria anyway.</p><p>I apologize for leaving out this portion of the Standard Process Court&#39;s opinion. I&#39;m surprised and pleased about the level of engagement with this dry and confusing material. &nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Lastly, I think your point about other SEs and alternate/future uses is really interesting. Again, the lawyers/judges aren&#39;t operating on nearly the sophistication necessary to create really subtle, accurate, and useful opinions. Confusion abounds.</p><p>Thanks so much for this discussion! I hope that those people in a position to influence the law find it useful as well. We need more practitioners weighing in on internet law issues.&nbsp; </p>

<p><em>OMG, I just spent a significant amount of time coming up with a nice detailed response to your concerns, then my session timed out and I lost it when I tried to post!&nbsp; ARgh.</em> </p><p><em>Thus, here is a less articulate, much shorter response to your concerns.</em> </p><p>The things stopping plaintiffs from adding Google into the mix are the same things that have always stopped people from adding Google into the mix: (1) it&#39;s expensive and (2) you don&#39;t get better results. </p><p>It&#39;s expensive because Google will bring in a formidable team of attorneys who you then have to respond to. This increases costs in what is already likely to be a very expensive case. (TM cases are VERY expensive because you&#39;ve got to run all these crap surveys about whether consumers were confused etc etc.) Thus, TM cases are usually brought to force the other party to settle.&nbsp;</p><p>Well, the things that Orion is complaining about (use of its TM in ad copy) is already prohibited by Google. Thus, if stopping this kind of use was your only goal, you just need to invoke Google&#39;s TM Complaint policy. Judges don&#39;t like it when you go to Court to get the remedy that you could have gotten just by asking.&nbsp;</p><p>Also, don&#39;t forget that you&#39;re unlikely to get any money out of Google. Google could invoke the publisher/printer defense to contributory infringement which eliminates money damages and leaves open only an injunction. Thus, you&#39;re not going to make the money back that you spent on litigation by suing Google. &nbsp;</p><p>In cases where the two companies have similar names and only one owns the TM, it makes much more sense to just sue the infringing company because you can get all the relief you need (across all forms of advertising, not just SEs) for relatively cheap. </p><p>&nbsp;Also, another interesting thing to keep in mind is that the Orion Order was based on agreed order and therefore no issues of law were tried in a meaningful way. Further, it was only a district court order (the lowest of the federal courts), which means that it is not precedential or binding for other courts.&nbsp; </p><p>The Orion case simply didn&#39;t address any of the interesting issues about keyword-triggered advertising that could destroy the value propisition for advertisers and SEs....Questions about whether purchasing or using trademark-protected keywords (through Adwords or meta tags or other &quot;invisible&quot; uses) constitutes a &quot;use in commerce&quot; and is confusing to consumers.&nbsp;</p><p>Hope this helps to clarify my argument above and not just make it more confusing. : )&nbsp; </p>

<p>It&#39;s an excellent question Levi. </p><p>There is no discussion of NDAs/contracts in the Complaint whatsoever. </p><p>Generally, a non-disclosure agreement would prevent an SEO from using confidential information for personal gain (i.e., not in furtherance of the business relationship) or from disclosing confidential information.&nbsp;</p><p>From the allegations contained in the Complaint, it&#39;s not entirely clear that a breach of a non-disclosure covenant would be the strongest claim to hold Hollings liable for his conduct. After all, anyone without access to anything confidential could have made some &quot;tribute&quot; CDs, become an affiliate, or created domains that trade on <em>The Secrets</em> trademark. And even with the kickback arrangement Hollings allegedly had with a vendor, I&#39;m not sure that&#39;s a disclosure issue since Hollings was authorized to talk with and select vendors... It could be a tough argument that his knowledge of confidential information is linked to his conduct.&nbsp; </p><p>I think the trademark claims are the strongest. The breach of fiduciary duties has the potential to be strong, but we would need to know a lot more about the facts. &nbsp;</p><p>I&#39;ll be curious to see what arguments both sides come up with if this goes to summary judgment.&nbsp;</p><p>Great questions! </p>

<p>It&#39;s <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q23bx-3CBWw" rel="nofollow">actually</a> <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ydlp0FaPp-g" rel="nofollow">a big problem</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1qmRA-ZvZQ" rel="nofollow">consumer</a> <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNgSvQ0LKdY" rel="nofollow">spontaneous combustion.</a>&nbsp;</p><p>I&#39;m very concerned about it. </p><p>; ) </p>

<p>Ryan, </p><p>There are many people on this site who know more about cookies than I do. However, I think I might be able to offer some clarity.</p><p>First, it is important to understand that NAI only affects the targeting behavior of its member companies. It does not have any effect on the many many advertising companies that are not members of NAI.</p><p>Second, each individual can have a number of different cookies. Each cookie can have a different role. One cookie may collect certain kind of information. Another cookie may determine which advertisement to offer the user.&nbsp; These different cookies are automatically uploaded to your browser when you visit a site used by the advertiser. </p><p>NAI&#39;s opt-out program does not delete cookies. Instead, it puts a new cookie in your browser that communicates to member sites &quot;Don&#39;t put the targeting cookie here. You can put other kinds of information-gathering cookies here, but do not put the cookie that targets ads here.&quot; In this way, the opt-out cookie acts as a filter to member sites.</p><p>It does seem counter-intuitive to use a cookie to block a cookie, but there are some good reasons for this. First, cookies provide the most scalable solution for creating highly functional and personal web experiences. For example, your one-click Amazon shopping cart experience is facilitated by the use of cookies. Most consumers want the functionality that cookies provide. &nbsp;</p><p>The problem is that many many consumers are concerned about having their information tracked and aggregated. Some consumers attempt to mitigate this risk by erasing all cookies. Of course, this erases your &quot;good&quot; cookies, including any opt-out cookies. </p><p>Highly advanced users who place a premium on privacy manually select certain cookies for erasure and preserve others. They also make sure they have a dynamic IP address to make it more difficult to track and aggregate their internet behavior. </p><p>I hope that this helps clarify the many different roles that cookies play and the different strategies for managing them. </p><p>I agree that NAI&#39;s opt-out cookie doesn&#39;t seem to address consumer&#39;s real concerns. I think the real benefit that NAI provides is the promulgation of standards for information use and sharing that its members must abide by. I&#39;m more impressed by the members&#39; commitment not to collect personally identifying information than I am by the misguided &quot;opt-out&quot; cookie.</p><p>Thanks for your comment!&nbsp;</p>

<p>The audience seemed hostile to having their information tracked and logged without their knowledge. People are certainly concerned about both privacy and identity theft risks. </p><p>I gauged hostility based upon both the general atmosphere and the number of questions from the audience about consumer control. There seemed to be a general murmur rumbling through the audience about the possibility that their viewing and purchasing history could be linked with their personal identifying information, and also made available to the government or anyone with a subpoena.</p><p>Thanks for your questions Calamier!&nbsp;</p>

<p>Next week&#39;s Legal Monday, <em>Keeping the Intern Out of Jail: A Losing Battle</em></p><p>&nbsp;;)</p><p>Another awesome post Danny! You&#39;re on Fire!&nbsp; </p><p>&nbsp;</p>

<p>I have added a really large update linking to SEOmoz&#39;s Opposition proceedings and describing the filing process.</p><p>I hope every finds this information useful.&nbsp;</p><p>Sincere Regards,</p><p>Sarah&nbsp;</p>

<p>I wonder that as well. </p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><strong>Would sure be nice if he voluntarily withdrew his application so that the rest of us don&#39;t have to spend hundreds of dollars and time and energy into opposing it.</strong></p><p><strong>HINT HINT, Gambert. </strong></p><p>I&#39;m just doing the finishing touches on my Notice of Opposition now. I will be filing it and making it available to everyone very soon. </p>

A thousand apologies about the underlines.

<p>wow. It looks like he&#39;s not even using &quot;SEO&quot; in commerce!&nbsp; No wonder is specimen looked a little odd...like perhaps it was crafted just for the benefit of the TMO. &nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;Actually, the whole site looks a little off, right?&nbsp;</p><p>Great find!&nbsp; </p>

<p>I&#39;m really glad that people are willing to get involved. I&#39;m currently putting together my Notice of Opposition. I will make an update to this post hopefully tomorrow morning outlining what I have done and posting mine as an example. </p><p>Of course, I can&#39;t give legal advice. Thus, it&#39;s always best for you to consult your trademark attorney if you have specific questions about how a trademark for SEO would affect your business. </p><p>That said, I will write about my experience in filing my Notice of Opposition tomorrow. In short, you can do most of it online at the <a href="http://estta.uspto.gov/filing-type.jsp" rel="nofollow">Electronic Filing Office</a>.You also need to create a short and plain statement about why you are opposing the registration. Finally, there is a substantial filing fee, $300, in order to file a Notice of Opposition. </p><p>That&#39;s hint of what&#39;s to come. </p><p>Thanks for your comments and your support everyone. </p><p>Sarah&nbsp;</p>

Well done Sherlock.