The French oxymoron called Quaero

In January, I wrote about Quaero, a planned European multimedia search engine, the answer to Google and brainchild of the French government.

My own thoughts about it were expressed thus:

[...] The idea of Quaero is a terrific one. Yet I can’t imagine anything more oxymoronic than “government-backed search engine.”

Loic Le Meur - a Frenchman - has posted a withering commentary on this oxymoron, lambasting the French government in the process.

Headline points from Loic’s 10 reasons why the French search engine will fail:

1. Can’t spell it.
2. Centralized.
3. Secret versus beta.
4. No buzz, no adoption.
5. A galaxy of actors who compete to get the subventions and don’t get much noticed for their latest web innovations.
6. Not really international.
7. A neverending story.
8. Not enough euros.
9. Subventions euros are not worth venture capital euros.
10. Google is a thousand startups

See Loic’s post for the excruciating details.

Other relevant posts you may find interesting:

• The political cynicism of Quaero
• Why no one trusts politicians and CEOs
• One-click websites from Google
• In search, is page equal to screen?
• It’s not good to Google in any language