Perhaps they wouldn't have fallen for @hotmail because @gmail is more popular and raises fewer eyebrows.
But here's the problem: you can use your own email all day long and unless you become a world famous gmail hater, people will still assume that name@gmail is yours. And even if you are a gmail hater not everybody will know about it.
I have a name@gmail account which sometimes receives other people's mail because somebody sends it to name@gmail instead of name@somethingelse