Rand Fishkin of SEOmoz has a fascinating (and probably startling to some) post up discussing some new guidelines from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) regarding online marketing. The post stems from SEOmoz’s COO Sarah Bird, who is an expert on legal matters pertaining to marketing, and some things she revealed in a recent interview. WebProNews readers will recognize her from these WPN videos on various legal topics.

Earlier, we looked at the top domains and pages in terms of linking popularity among different linkers. Collectively, they are referred to as the most important domains and pages on the web.

Nielsen Online, however, has looked at the top online companies and brands for the month of March. This data looks at unique audience and time per person spent with each. Take a look at these charts from Nielsen:

SEOmoz has a couple of very interesting charts showing the top 500 domains and the top 500 pages being linked to from different places. This paints a pretty good picture of what sites are held in the highest regards by content producers.

I am tired of so many new and old SEOs talk about linking, the importance of it and how your efforts will be wasted if you don’t embrace it. I like linking and believe it provides a good way to build credibility on the search engines, especially for new sites, but I put it last on my list. That’s right I said last. I may be old school but I have found I can cut back my dependency (time) on the number/quality of incoming links if I follow some basic principles.

Rand Fishkin blogged about the little bits of secrets discussed at a session of the recent SMX Advanced conference; the session centers on some of the tips and tricks that aren’t widely known in search marketing.

Just when you thought it was over: May 19 was the deadline for the man who would be SEO trademark holder to respond to notices of opposition to his trademark application (which were filed by SEOmoz, Arteworks, Beanstalk Search Engine Positioning, SEO.com, Jonathan Hochman, and Rhea Drysdale). Sarah Bird, Esq., of SEOmoz filed for default judgment in the case on Tuesday.

Sarah Bird, Esquire, of SEOmoz, Inc., happened upon the applicant’s request as she was working on some trademarks for SEOmoz. Not only is the applicant actually trying to obtain a trademark for the mark “SEO,” but he is also already on the way to the publication process.

This article talks about how social networks can make a post go viral – or spread like crazy.

It focuses specifically on the biggest social networks – MySpace and Facebook. Facebook tends to be a bit more technical – allowing you to utilize apps to spread the word. They also attract different types of people.