Now, how is it that the scammers thought they’d get away with this? Especially the thing about using the Google name?

Gosh, I was almost thinking of changing the name of my blog to “Google Pink Slip”.

I mean, when you google “google pink slip”, my blog comes up. (Ditto for “pink slip google.”) I am so on to something.

And Pink Slip lives on blogspot, which Google owns. So we’re almost related already. Just saying.

Not to mention that, since the Google name is golden, if I called my blog Google Pink Slip, maybe some of Google $$$ magic would rub off on me. Sure, Pink Slip’s a hobby, so I really shouldn’t be thinking about trying to make a buck off it. I mean, if I wanted to make a buck off it, I’d have figured out the key would be to mono-focus on something, so that everyone in the world who shares that mono-focus would find their way here. Then I could a write a book, with pretty much of a guarantee that everyone who shared that mono-focus would buy it.

So Pink Slip maybe should have  been a little more niche-oriented.  Something that would have yielded a made-for-the-niche book like “Crocheted Dog Boots for Folks Who Hate the Yankees.”  Or “The Survival Guide for Those Who Labor in a 7 x 7 Steelcase Cubicle, Next to a Guy Who Belches All Day.” Or “Accepting Your Inner-Non-Cook: Why Not Convert Your Kitchen to a Sunroom?”

Whatever I decide to do here, my embroidering my blog’s name with the name Google wouldn’t be sleazy, exploitative, or misleading. No way! I’d be completely above board. My use of Google would be homage, not damage.

Not like those rotters who tried to sell work-from-home products using the good and golden Google name.

“Google Pro,” “Google Money Tree,” and “Google Treasure Chest.”

How could they!

Well, as it turns out, they couldn’t.

The scam-bos who tried to exploit the good and golden Google name have been taken down.  For suckering folks into thinking they could make $100k in just six months, and then clipping them for monthly charges (that hadn’t been fully disclosed), for which the eager work-from-home hopefuls got next to nada in return, a few crapoid, bogus operaters have been taken down:

The settlement includes a $29.5 million judgment against defendants Jonathan Eborn; Michael McLain Miller; Tony Norton; Infusion Media Inc.; West Coast Internet Media Inc.; Two Warnings LLC; Two Part Investments LLC; and Platinum Teleservices Inc. (Source: WSJ Online.)

I really like that “Two Warnings LLC” name. Way. To. Go. with the truth in advertising. But I must admit that I don’t understand how anyone with access to the Internet, and who, presumably, recognizes the name “Google”, doesn’t get that, before you sign up for “Google Treasure Chest”, it might be wise to google “Google Treasure Chest.”  I guess that hope springs, etc., and for someone with no other prospects, the prospect of earning $100K in 6 months – which is no doubt a significant multiple of any amount that person had ever earned in six months in real life – must seem very tempting. Especially when you could earn it from home, without having to have any experience or particular skills. (Didn’t their mothers ever warn them – or even give them two warnings – that if someone sounds too good to be true, it probably is?)

A fourth defendant, Stephanie Burnside, is subject to a judgment of $741,900, the FTC said. The defendants will give up cash and other assets that include two cars, interests in a Harley-Davidson Inc. motorcycle and a boat, and a gun collection—which total about $3.5 million. The unpaid portions of these judgments are suspended based on the defendants' inability to pay.

Oh, no! Not the gun collection.

The crew has also been

…banned from selling products through "negative option" transactions—in which the seller interprets consumers' silence or inaction as permission to charge them.

Shouldn’t everyone be banned from this practice? Or is this kind of like signing up for the monthly charge for the WSJ Online subscription – which they woo you into by making it a lot cheaper than if you paid a lump sum for the year – and having it auto- renew into perpetuity?  Hmmmm…

The defendants also are barred from making misleading or unsupported claims while marketing or selling any product or service.

Uh-oh.  Good thing there’s no law against this one, or a lot of marketers I know would be on shaky grounds. (Not me, of course: I stick strictly to b&w, just the facts marketing.) Not to mention a lot of sales folks. (They might even have to sell their gun collections.)  But I guess it depends on what the definition of “misleading” or “unsupported” is.

Forgot to mention that those bums also used the Google logo.

I’d never do that.