ebay v. Google – Revolution and Revelry

Last week was the ebay developers conference/ebay Live!, the week-long series of events for ebay developers and power sellers, took place in Boston. The usual smatterings of self-promoting conference topics were presented. Widgets and gadgets made some noise (including the new box we've embedded here showing items for sale relating to the search term "Romney") and ebay enthusiasts networked and discussed success in hawking their wares. The real news wasn't the official program ebay lined up for their flagship yearly showcase, the story that keeps brewing is the growing disconnect between Google and the auction site.

Google announced a rival party for last Thursday night on the Google Checkout Blog citing revolutionary inspiration:

join us for a celebration of user choice at the Google Checkout Freedom Party on Thursday night…follow the freedom trail to the Old South Meeting House. We’ll use the same spot where revolutionaries launched the Boston Tea Party to celebrate freedom with free food, free drinks, free live music -- even free massages.

ebay got pissed and pulled their ads officially says their ads were pulled from Google keywords ads as part of a regular evaluation of their marketing efforts. The Google Checkout party was cancelled before it happened last week, the focus on ebay was retained. It appears that the Google Checkout v. ebay's PayPal fight for dominance has now begun, and with a botched attempt at a freedom party here in Boston.