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EU to Develop Search Engine
Posted by
ScuttleMonkey
on Mon Jan 16, 2006 02:04 PM
from the searching-for-answers dept.
from the searching-for-answers dept.
William Robinson writes "Digital Media is reporting that French President Jacques Chirac is making plans for a European search engine called "Quaero" to rival US internet companies such as Yahoo and Google. From the article: 'Those involved in the Quaero project, including Thomson, France Telecom and Deutsche Telekom, have said that it will be much more than a typical search engine. It will provide an array of multimedia tools for identifying and indexing images, sound and text. Quaero will also reportedly include a powerful translating tool which will be able to 'understand' audio as well as text. The developers plan to make Quaero available on all platforms, including PCs, mobile devices and digital TVs.'"
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Anything you can do I can do better... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Anything you can do I can do better... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Anything you can do I can do better... (Score:4, Insightful)
You do realize, don't you, that France is a nuclear power[0], and sold[1] to Iraq 12.5kg of 93% U-235 and "research reactor".
And lets not forget the direct German help[2] in creating Iraqi chemical weapons.
[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/France_and_weapons_o
[1] http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/iraq/facility/osira
[2] http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/iraq/cw/az120103.ht
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Re:Why Google Won and Chirac Won't (Score:5, Insightful)
Look who's in the boat here - that reads like a who is who of the Public Fundinds Burning Society. Deutsche Telekom, France Telekom, both fornmer state monopolists, Thomson, french electronics giant and perpetual receiver of ample state subsidies. The rest is probably of similar calibre.
While your intent here is right and the wordplay is cute, that's deeply offensive to a great Italian car tradition that is way more succesfull and receptive to their customers needs than any EU buerocrats pet project ever could be.
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January 16, 2011 (Score:5, Funny)
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. - January 16, 2011 - Google Inc. (Nasdaq: GOOG) today announced it acquired France, a country located in Western Europe, mostly associated with fine cheeses, wine, berets, and the 5-yr old search engine "Quaero".
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Re:January 16, 2011 (Score:4, Funny)
"26th of April 2006, Google declares war on France
27th of April 2006, France surrenders and hands over presidency to Larry Page"
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Re:January 16, 2011 (Score:3, Funny)
Oh, am I going to get nailed for this one...
Re:January 16, 2011 (Score:3, Informative)
Wikipedia has more details. [wikipedia.org]
Real reason (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Real reason (Score:4, Funny)
Deutsche Telekom get involved?
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You all laugh, but... (Score:3, Interesting)
A funny question on the face of it but a very serious one if you think about it. What is to stop a government built search engine from tweaking the results just a bit to elimate embarrasment?
I think governments have no business in entreprises that involve shaping what media citizens see.
And for those paranoid about NSA apying, just why do you think they aim to parse the audio in the first place? Hint; It's not primar
Quaero.com taken (Score:3, Insightful)
Inquiring minds want to know.
Check out http://www.quaero.com/ [quaero.com] - its a marketing company from Charlotte, North Carolina.
Re:Quaero.com taken (Score:5, Funny)
And they're pretty damn good at viral marketing if they even get the President of France to advertise for them.
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Quaero.eu (Score:3, Interesting)
Additionally, who knows what kind of alternative algorithm tweak they might give results. For example, boosting
Why? (Score:3, Informative)
Also, just because the government says that it should "understand" spoken audio, I'm pretty sure that no existing technology could even come close (<sarcasm>just look at the wonderful translation tools</sarcasm>).
Re:Why? (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:Why? (Score:3, Interesting)
Not always. Examples would be the Interstate Highway system and TVA. The market generally won't carry large scale farsighted neccesities. The highway system and TVA served as a primer for private commerce in the US which we are enjoying today. Some projects have to be done by the Government when private interestes can't deliver. Quaero obviously is not one of them as several private companies are in the search engine bus
Re:Why? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Why? (Score:5, Insightful)
And you really expect a self serving religious movement to exercise compassion efficiently? Compassionate people excercise compassion, not community organizations. Get enough money in an org and the greedy come in and push the compassion right out the door.
Parent
Re:Why? (Score:3, Insightful)
This is, most likely, not the case. Healthcare, like gasoline, fresh water, and electricity is less an elective service, and more of a utility. In order to survive, you will most likely need health care at some point. It is highly unlikely that you will shop around while your appendix is bursting. And ultimately, you will pay whatever they tell you to pay, because you could die withou
Re:Why? (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes. Google's founders are part of the market. Even if they developed a lot of it in college, they were still acting to fill a void in the market.
Maybe you interpreted "true need" improperly. The internet was not a need before it existed. It has since become a need.
Nothing to see (Score:5, Informative)
So basically, a bunch of European telecoms companies are discussing how to compete with Google. And this is news why? Nothing to see here.
French search results? (Score:4, Funny)
Results: 1. "I fart in your general direction".
Seriously, though - I definitely think there's a market for an effective multimedia search engine: imagine being able to whistle a song into your mic, for example and being told what it was called.
Not going to work well (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm not saying it won't happen, just that it'll face lots of problems in a new governmental organization that is still trying to get its feet under it.
Doomed to failure? (Score:4, Insightful)
It's great that the EU is trying to assert itself in this area - having the US control 90% of the internet's technology is exactly the type of monoculture that is decried on the desktop - but is there any way this project won't end up crushed under the weight of its own bureaucracy?
Missing Feature (Score:5, Insightful)
You know, I thought marketing vaporware claims were bad, but political marketing vaporware, now that's whole new dimensions of vapor. It's bad enough when marketing has excessive influence on tech development, can you imagine what it'll be like when politicians are involved as a matter of "national prestige"? I have not the humor chops to properly satirize that.
Three Cheers for an "Industrial Policy" (Score:5, Insightful)
The Soviets turned their national scientific and research genius into making *one* perfect washing machine, as the foolish Americans splintered their effort among competing companies tearing each other to shreds in destructive competition over shape and color.
"Today, we are behind you. Soon we will be even with you, and we shall pass you, in glorious progress toward perfect socialism and communism!" (or something like that).
How can feeble, fractured American enterprises like Yahoo and Google survive competition with the might of central, coordinated European industrial policy???
Right.
Wow (Score:4, Funny)
Something like its a search engine that after you enter in a query, it rudely refuses.
The Latin pedant steps in... (Score:5, Funny)
I had also heard... (Score:4, Funny)
Quaero? (Score:4, Funny)
A few points to the EU powermongers... (Score:5, Insightful)
2. Start asking us EU citizens if we'd mind you spending our cash on something that isn't really required
3. get out of the mindset that the internet is somehow defined by geographical borders and edges - just what is an EU search engine? Does it just search the EU? What?
4. How about attacking the problem of low tech-esteem in Europe not by building a government-sponsered programme (which no doubt will require taxpayers money to be thrown at it year on year), but by fostering an environment where private tech companies can flourish (like in the US).
You mean india surely (Score:3, Insightful)
But I got a suggestion for any eu citizen who thinks the US is heaven on earth. Emigrate. It is actually fairly easy provided you got some half decent job skills and money. No you are not allowed to say anything bad about US immigration policy, remember, your a US fanboy.
1. Pff, I link to it once and that is it. I can always google for it
2. I rather
Re:You mean india surely (Score:4, Informative)
It grew [yahoo.com] 16% last year. Instead, let's talk about Microsoft and Google. Those two companies compare favorably to most Europeon nations, on their own. But let's not silly facts get in the way of your ramblings.
2. I rather they spend it on this then on a war.
Awesome. Here's a bit of logic for you. "This is a good idea because I don't like America and they spend money on a war. This costs money, therefore it is good." That's grade A bullshit.
3. Perhaps a search engine that does not bow to the Chinese goverment in the name of the almighty dollar?
Do we really need to talk about the bullshit the French government does for it's almighty Franc? How about Nazi references? Be honest, wouldn't you be bitching just as much if google -hadn't- respected the wishes of China, and then you could say "Imperiliast America and google imposiing it's will on other nations for the almighty dollar". This is your best steaming pile, yet.
4. Yeah, because the top cellphone company is european and all your pc's are made in the US. No I rather we keep our model. So do the majority of EU voters. EU socialist, US capatalist. Move to location of your choice.
This is the best one yet. Clearly you refer to Nokia [nokia.com]. A company that is #1 because it competes in the free market with no government benefits at all. And this is your evidence supporting "socialism". Isn't that... ironic? Err no, wait... It's just plain wrong.
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Re:You mean india surely (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:You mean india surely (Score:3, Insightful)
What the hell are you talking about?
http://www.google.de/search?hl=de&q=nazi&btnG=Goog le-Suche&meta= [google.de]
http://www.google.fr/search?hl=fr&q=Nazi&btnG=Rech erche+Google&meta= [google.fr]
Re:You mean india surely (Score:4, Informative)
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/filtering/google/ [harvard.edu]
http://siliconvalley.internet.com/news/article.ph
Notice:
http://www.google.de/search?hl=de&q=nazi&btnG=Goo
Ergebnisse 1 - 10 von ungefähr 28.300.000 für nazi. (0,03 Sekunden)
http://www.google.fr/search?hl=fr&ie=ISO-8859-1&q
Résultats 1 - 10 sur un total d'environ 28 300 000 pour nazi. (0,05 secondes)
http://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en
Results 1 - 10 of about 29,900,000 for nazi [definition]. (0.04 seconds)
See the search count numbers? Don't blame it on language. Lets search for Nazi in
http://www.google.co.jp/search?q=Nazi&btnG=%CF%EE
Nazi 29,900,000 1 - 10 (0.05 )
Neat, huh?
Keep in mind, unless you specify google to focus on your language, the search results should be _exactly_ the same across local sites. Except if they tamper with the results, which both Google and Yahoo do for Germany and France.
Research on Similar experiences with china:
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/filtering/china/ [harvard.edu]
Sadly, you can't test the Chinese version from outside China. cyberlaw sometimes has a proxy running in China that will allow you to test it, but its currently down. A google filters those results based upon whether your IP block is Chinese or not.
Here's someone's test. You don't have to believe it, I guess:
http://www.dit-inc.us/report/google200409/google.
Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_words_blocke
Interestingly enough, looks like our Congress criters may be trying to change this behavior:
http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9595_22-6026733.html [zdnet.com]
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I hope they change the name (Score:3, Insightful)
"...making plans for..." (Score:3, Interesting)
igital Media is reporting that French President Jacques Chirac is making plans for a European search engine called "Quaero" to rival US internet companies such as Yahoo and Google.
"Making plans for" is a long, long way from delivering anything. I'm betting that once they start to realize the scope of what they're suggesting, they will change their tune a bit. Or at least scale back the idea somewhat. A google that understands audio and video?
Good luck though, because after all it's saying "why not" that makes change happen - but I think they'll be surprised when they realize the magnitude of their undertaking. Underestimating Google is a classic internet blunder.
How much will they have to block. (Score:4, Interesting)
Not an EU project (Score:5, Informative)
Sheesh (Score:3, Insightful)
This isn't the first time our dear (cough) beloved (gak) President presses for a catch-up plan in the digital world. Remember he started a project to digitize our paper legacy, in an attempt to counter Google's similar but english-language project.
Now I can vaguely undestand the motivation behind such a move: present a counter force against english-language cultural domination. (considering how China is growing, I'm not sure american culture is the one to be feared in the coming century). This *is* a cultural problem on the internet. I'd rather we all speak a common language, but to each his own.
Maybe he's trying to get his name in the history books for starting such projects. People tend to try that when they get to that age. I could understand that too.
Of course, this project would be in direct competition with Google, such as it's presented. It strikes me as basic economic common sense that a trans-european politically-led project has not a snowball's chance in hell in any market competition.
Maybe as an academic project?...
EU has self-esteem issues (Score:3, Insightful)
Now that it didn't quote work our, they decided to settle for the next big thing, which is have their own "European Search Engine".
What the hell is that? A joke? And I actually live in Europe so it hurts to say this. I'd be proud if an European company comes up with "the next Google" but coming from the French government it comes up as a "me too" behaviour.
Re:I think it's called "independence". (Score:5, Insightful)
A:Ego
Also, it's not European companies, it's a European govenrment subsidising European companies.
Parent
Re:I think it's called "independence". (Score:3, Insightful)
This aptly describes US defence and areospace industry.
Re:I think it's called "independence". (Score:3, Funny)
Boy, you sure didn't pay enough attention in Dialectics, huh?
Re:Why Is This in Politics??!! (Score:4, Insightful)
In this you are very wrong. This is all about politics: get control of vital resources. EU views USA with Bush II in power with deep scepticism, and tries to wrestle as much control as they can since USA has become sort of unreliable. Quite simply, enemies of USA is scared more than ever and close allies are apprehensive. Those that thinks this is good are fools (not that I suggest that you thinks so).
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Re:Erm, vapourware anyone? (Score:3, Funny)
Well, not exactly. If the EU is going to be shitting out money like a broken slot machine, it remains for you and I to figure out how we can get a piece of this. I'm certain that, given the proper funding, I can help them solve the technical obstacles before them However, for deeply complicated reasons (it's complicated) much of my research will need to be conducted in places like Bali and the Bahamas and so forth.
Re:Also in the news: (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah why must hollywood remake french movies? (Score:5, Insightful)
The following bit of info may shock some people so please, little kids leave the room, adults brace youreselve.
GOOGLE SUCKS AS A SEARCH ENGINE
Anyone still around? Good, we judge google by its peers and its peers are the totall crappers so by comparison google looks pretty good. BUT imagine that the people at google had thought "Oh, there already is a search engine no need to make another." We would still be using altavista or something.
Google is fairly good at returning pages regarding obscure linux error messages. When however your search should include words in common usage or possible of a retail product or god forbid be associated in anyway with the adult industry then you are floundering in page after page of crap results.
There is an even worse problem. Despite all what the fanboys will tell you Google is a business. A business that now not just provides search and ads but is becoming a content broker itself.
Could google one day prefer its own pages over others? For now the opposite it seems, I can't get google to return its own videos that it sells BUT some goverments might feel that internet search has become such an important tool that there is some importance to having an alternative to just depending on the US.
America is a funny country, ever since WW2 america has been complaining that it has to do foot the bill for the entire world defence. Europe thinks of creating a european army and the US gets upset. US taxpayer pay for the free GPS of the entire world and they complain. EU makes it own version and americans get upset.
Here is a suggestion for americans, you run your country your way and we run ours our way.
What you are missing is that not every goverment has the same motives. Perhaps some feel that not being a slave to america is a good thing. Since you aren't paying for it with your taxes what business is it of yours?
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