Comments on: Mistaken Identity: Wearing Google Shirts To An eBay Event Might Be Bad For Your Health

By: Danny Sullivan

Danny Sullivan — Fri, 22 Jun 2007 18:19:11 +0000

I agree, Kari — there’s a strong feeling of “they were asking for it” in that piece. Getting tossed out for just wearing Google shirts would be one thing. But when it’s wearing those (somewhat deliberately, it seems), then going out and effectively lobbying for Google Checkout (the “it just came up naturally” part felt a bit weak), it doesn’t seem so innocent. Then again, the eBay reaction from not accepting Google Checkout at all in the first place and pulling the two aside in the end feels strange as well.

By: kari

kari — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 14:11:59 +0000

I don’t know about anyone else, but it seems strange to me that they would wear Google shirts. I realize that they didn’t work for Google, and they had every right to be there; but it seems almost like they were trying to incite something. By the third day of the show, it was already the news of the moment that eBay and Google were in a row over the Google event, and I find it hard to believe that they didn’t know that Google Checkout would be a highly sensitive issue on the show floor and with eBay staff.

If you’re with your own company and you’re trying to promote it, why not wear polo shirts with your own logo?

By: evilgreenmonkey

evilgreenmonkey — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 12:24:10 +0000

I’ll wear my eBay t-shirt to the next Google Dance to see what happens :oD

By: Matt Cutts

Matt Cutts — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 17:25:01 +0000

Barry, in the blog post you pointed to, the person who was kicked out says that he is not employed by Google:

“I tried to explain that we were there to promote our own, different kind of product, which just happens to use Google Checkout at the moment, that I really don’t work for Google, and that I bought my shirt and backpack at googlestore.com and wear them to a lot of computer conventions.”

So it’s not accurate to call the person who was ejected a “Googler.” That is a word for a Google employee, and it sounds like this person doesn’t work for Google at all.

By: Philipp Lenssen

Philipp Lenssen — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 14:42:20 +0000

Update: Paul in the comments http://blog.outer-court.com/forum/99756.html#id99788 points to another post that makes it likely that these two weren’t Google employees, but that due to their Google shirts (and perhaps the fact they were indirectly promoting Google Checkout in their conference chats), they were possibly mistaken for Google employees in any case by the security.