"23 per cent of adult internet users in the US have searched online for their clients or customers, workers or potential employees, and supervisors or prospective managers." (link)
I usually google people I am doing business with, it helps me find out more info about their background and on the way they think. Not too much help in the case of Romanian ones, though things have started to change. Scoble says he wouldn't hire anybody who can't be found via search engines. Actually a friend of mine who's living in US kinda fricked out because he couldn't find anything about his date while googling her. It turned out to be allright in the end though. :)
Good find :) I managed to shock someone with my lack of enthusiasm in googling people; I still prefer to get my facts in person, but I admit there are things one wouldn't spit out if one's life depended on it, and sometimes Google fills a void. Now I went from one extreme to another and I am looking up everybody I am remotely interested in. Why does it feel like probing someone's ports?! :) The fact of the matter is: be careful what you post and where as Google has an impressive cache history and is lame at keeping secrets...