eBay Pulls Google Ads Over Marketing Stunt

odoketa writes "According to the BBC, it seems Google scheduled a party to promote their payment system (Google Checkout) on the same day as a big eBay meeting, and this made eBay mad enough to pull their ads with Google. According to the story, eBay says it's merely an 'ongoing experiment' on their marketing. 'Google hoped to alert PayPal users who would have been in Boston attending the eBay Live annual seller event to its own service, according to market experts. It could also have been seen as part of an effort to get eBay to accept Google Checkout, currently banned on the online auctioneer's site. But in a contrite manner, Google cancelled its rival function a day before it was due to happen.'"

Re:eBay wouldn't do that

[Rik Sweeney]

They advertise on Google to draw traffic to eBay

Precisely! Otherwise, how would I know that I can find sinusitis relief on eBay?

But where will I buy my search results now?

[glindsey]

This is horrible! Now, when I search for "software interrupt," I won't see "Looking for software interrupt? Find new and used software interrupt and thousands more items on eBay!"

This is going to make things much more difficult.

Re:So hard to choose sides

[The Breeze]

This is obvious a fake post.

I mean, come on, someone claiming to have actually gotten Paypal on the phone? How likely is that?

"We're Paypal. We don't care. We don't have to."
-apologies to SNL.