Members of the search engine optimisation community have come together to praise the work of Rhea Drysdale, who won her battle to prevent the term SEO from being trademarked earlier this month.
Drysdale spent two years fighting a trademark application by Jason Gambert for the term SEO. In a blog post, Drysdale recounts her battle which began with a notice of opposition to Gambert’s application on April 24, 2008 and ended on March 11, 2010 when the application was terminated by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
Matt Cutts, head of Google’s Webspam team, added a link to the story from his own blog and suggested making donations to help cover Drysdale’s legal costs which totalled $17,004.
Over 150 people have now written on Drysdale’s blog to show their appreciation. PayPal donations have also flooded in and $17,000 has now been raised by the industry.
Cutts said: “Rhea took on a big fight for the benefit of the SEO industry, saw it through to the end — and won! In the process, she earned the sort of credibility that you just can’t buy.”
In a message of thanks on her website, Drysdale said: “After an overwhelming show of support from the community, I wanted to take a minute to thank you.
“When I originally discussed the SEO trademark news with Search Engine Land, it was suggested that readers may want to donate to my legal funds. I tried to brush this off and we published the articles.
“I thought I was just telling the story of the past two years and this case, which took so much from me and the other opposers. Within minutes people were asking how they could send donations and I had to accept the fact that this was no longer just my fight.”
Drysdale has come in for a significant amount of praise from SEO professionals across the world, many leaving messages of thanks and congratulations on her website.
“Thank you for your courage and your fight to save our industry and its rights,” said one.
Many posters admitted they were unaware of the application to trademark the term SEO in the first place.
Another well-wisher said: “I applaud you for catching that this mark was even up for a Trademark, much less going to bat and putting money on the line to oppose its registration. Congrats, cheers, and thanks.”