Sundar Pichai fails to unmute his video call. Here's what happened
The Google CEO was interacting with Kermit The Frog as a part of YouTube's ‘Dear Earth’ series.
Since early last year, when the Covid-19 pandemic first swept across the globe, people have been forced to work from indoors. Though the situation has eased considerably since then, and restrictions have been relaxed across several countries, employees, by and large, continue to work from home. Because of this, office meetings have taken place through video calls, and often, while speaking during such meetings, people discovered that their mic was on mute all along.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai took to Twitter on Wednesday to share a similar experience. “Always remember to unmute…thanks @KermitTheFrog for joining us on @YouTube #DearEarth and chatting about some of our shared interests,” Pichai tweeted, along with a short, two-minute video clip of the interaction.
“Hi there, Sundar,” Kermit, a Muppet character created in 1955 said to Pichai, welcoming him for the interaction taking place as a part of YouTube's “Dear Earth” series. The India-born executive responds to Kermit, but the former is inaudible as his mic is on mute. “Sundar, I think you are on mute. Wow, can't believe I am talking to the CEO of Google, and he is on mute,” Kermit says.
At this point, which comes 11 seconds into the clip shared by Pichai, he realises his mistake and says, “Sorry Kermit. I was on mute, and I've done it a few times this year like everyone else. I'm huge fan of you and the muppets,” the Google CEO says, as Kermit returns the compliment.
The conversation continues, and eventually Sundar says that he and his children love watching, among other things, cricket highlights on YouTube. Kermit says that he, too, lives cricket, to which Pichai clarifies that he is talking about the game of cricket, and not the insect.
“Dear Earth” is a YouTube Originals programming which aims to address the sustainability challenges that the world is facing and solutions which can be adopted to bring about a change.