Did Your Doorman Google You?

Did they just Google you?

Doormen see a lot of clues going in and out of the lobby, but how curious do they get and how much further will they go to find out about the tenants in the buildings where they work? BrickUnderground opened a door to the reality that some doormen just may be Googling the people in their building. Here is the exchange they got from an interview with Rafat Ali, who founded and then sold ContentNext Media in California before moving to New York 6 months ago:

“Ali walked into his Murray Hill building yesterday morning [and] stopped to alert the doorman that he was expecting some guests for a housewarming party.

“His first reaction was, ‘You can’t go on the roof,’” says Ali, who immediately bristled at the doorman’s tone. “I said, ‘Okay, but now that you said that I might.”

The doorman accused Ali of having an “attitude,” then, according to Ali, blurted out: “You think you’re better than us. I Googled you and because you sold your company for however many millions of dollars, you think you are a bigshot.”

In the ensuing exchange, the doorman apparently threatened to have Ali kicked out of the building.

“I said ‘I don’t want to deal with this, I have guests coming over,’” says Ali.

So what do you do if you founded a new media company and somebody Googles you? You release your shock and awe on Twitter. That’s what Ali did and that’s how BrickUnderground found him.

According to the story, Ali has now received a written apology from the doorman, but it may be too late for the doorman to salvage a reputation with Ali. And as one person pointed out on twitter:

“Suppose it would be useless to point out that ‘sold company’ = ‘better holiday tip’?”

Photo Credit: garryknight

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