Kim Krause and Danny Sullivan both chipped in with great posts on the subject of the history of people, events and operations in the SEO world.
From Danny:
...it's also important to remember that if we do have A-Lists, B-Lists or whatever, no one's really going to completely agree on them. There are people at WebmasterWorld who simply live in that space look up only to those in the community there. Pick another forum, and you'll find the same. An "A-Lister" wading in isn't necessarily going to carry that A-List reputation earned in other places over. They'll either earn it anew or gain it because some in the "new" community they've entered with uprep them to others, because they feel it is deserved.
Beyond this, you've got people who have never, ever been to a search forum at all -- yet they can be successful search marketers. Life does not revolve around the forums. You've also got people who haven't been to a single search conference, or not read a particular blog, newsletter, whatever. Who is important to them may be completely different than someone else. Overall, as I explained in my keynote, we have a variety of SEO communities and leaders within those.
From Kim:
Those were the days when SEO was fun as heck to do. There were lots of search engines to get client web sites into, not just one or two like today. In my day, we had 10 strong contenders and lots of minors to play with. Each of them refused to sit still for long. They changed business models constantly. Part of my work was just keeping up with these changes, passing them on to clients and making adjustments to submission campaigns. Because, you see, in the old days, we submitted web sites to search engines and directories for clients.
We tracked progress. We tracked rank. There was no Page Rank score. There were few fees for submission. There were many tools to use, including software and web-based submission software, but hand-submitters like me were in demand because we oozed the thrill of SEO. There were scams everywhere and it became one of my own personal missions to alert web site owners on what to look out for.
Since I'm a relative newbie to the SEO space (having only been actively involved on forums, etc. since 2003), I love these kinds of posts. After all, if you don't know where you've been, you can't know where you're going (and, perhaps more importantly, you can't empathize and get drunk with folks who do).
2K - My guess is that you'd have some pretty interesting stories to tell!
Call me old-fashioned, but in terms of SEO, the best-practices used for building websites 8 years ago are the same ones that exist today. I don't think the philosophy has changed much (at least for people like me), although what has changed is the sophistication in which “problems” are dealt with. What I like about the community that has emerged is that we have people like Rand offering valuable education in terms that “everyone” can understand, and the Dannys / Bretts of the world creating exposure and offering education on a grander scale.
If I had my druthers… we would call what we do WO (web optimization), not SEO… although “WO” doesn’t sound as cool. Aside from some of the deeper site-structure issues, many of us agree that SEO is not a magic bullet that can only be performed by experts… it is simply a service best performed by experts.
A “good” website, all things equal… will rank well in the search engines, be highly usable, and will convert traffic in to results… thanks to the integrated approach some of us call “SEO.” In other words, I’ve learned not to view SEO purely as a tactic.
At least that’s my white-hat philosophy I’m sure I don’t speak for everyone.
Times change, people change, business change, methods change, values change... That's what a decade of world wide web has taught me; and what a valuable lesson it is.
Glad to see i'm not alone:)
BostonScott, you bring up a really good point. In SEO A-Listers & B-Listers stuntdubl asked me why I decided recently to become a more active participant in the forums after several years of lurking. I think that a big part of it is that after finding Seomoz I realize that there is a large SEO community that is more interested in cooperation than competition. That's a big deal.
I do think Danny makes a good point. There are plenty of us who have been in the SEO world for almost a decade (and others more), who have not built a public profile, and who have not participated in the forums. At this point, I think it would be fun (and educational) to get more involved if anything because I’m really happy with how the "community" has evolved.
I get the feeling that the “community” at large is one that does not take itself too seriously and works in the spirit of cooperation, but at the same time maintains the kinds of ideals that are important to me.
Rand, the fact that you would list “competitors” on your website speaks volumes.
My biggest issue has always been time… personally; I’m lobbying Congress to add a 25th hour. My sources tell me they’ll consider anything.