Quaero ... What the Hell is THAT?
The Washington Post recently ran an article about Quaero, which is a bass ackwards name for the search engine and software suite the French want to develop to prevent Google from having too much effect on their culture.
Quaero is billed as Europe's answer to Google, but it has a lot to live up to.
The awkward word _ which means "to search" in Latin _ is unlikely to flash across the continent's computer screens anytime soon.
So far Quaero is just a scattering of top tech minds in labs across France and Germany, working on what they hope will be the world's most advanced multimedia search engine.
Even dumber than picking Quaero as a name, it appears that Quaero.com is already owned by a marketing company. What the hell is the point of giving a new idea a dumb name if you can't even own the global domain name for it?
Not that I thought the project was going to have the legs, but with a name like that you just KNOW it is going nowhere.
Kelkoo is Europe's best bet
I think that Europeans wanting to ensure their search is homegrown should turn to Kelkoo (Europe's #1 comparison shopping engine); it has strong brand recognition already. It's owned by Yahoo now, but...
-Shorebreak
.com? How US-Centric! (joking)
Obviously, some pan-European project defined to counter US companies would have the .eu domain. I think Quaero.eu is still free (for now).
Do Europeans see eye to eye
Do Europeans see eye to eye enough to agree on a search engine ? I would think that to a user the best "european" search engine would be one that emphasises the searchers locale.
DOT COM?
Come on Aaron, if it was the Francophiles trying to protect their own it would be a .FR
Besides, the French have been resisting our culture (TV,Music,etc) for years and it's a losing battle evidenced by McDonalds and Pizza Hut delivery motorcycles when I was in Paris.
We are Borg, resistance is futile, you WILL be assimilated.
Sad in a way, to have US
Sad in a way, to have US culture dominate everything, especially considering the quality of our culture. I admit to being a hypocrite - I watch American TV and read American magazines, but the fast food, Hollywood & pop music trends in the US are nothing short of shit, IMO. I can empathize with the French, although I'm not really sure how a search engine is going to help resist Burger King, Britney Spears and How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days.
.eu
It wouldn't be if you didn't have to live in an EU area ;-)
Why is it sad?
The US is a homogenized society created originally mostly of EU country immigrants and now blended with every nationality and race on the planet.
It's no mystery why US culture is so popular, it's been made by everyone from every background on the planet.
See what happens when we can all get along inside one border?
Exalead
I think Exalead is a French-owned search engine and quite good IMO. If they had some money backing them they might be competitive.
Quaero is a really bad name. They need to let each nation and/or language group rebrand it into something the locals will recognize and can remember how to spell.
I missed the obvious....
Yo QUAERO Taco Bell
That would tick them off
all the good typo's are gone
.
Social issues aside, the
Social issues aside, the failure to own the .com of an internet-based company is a major branding failure, IMO.
Just for the record France
Just for the record France != Europe
>>major branding failure
Absolutely. I just purchased a 3 word (dictionary words) .com where there is a business who owns the keyword-keyword-keyword.com version of the name. For reasons unknown to me they didn't want the name, I bought it and it averages 5 unique typins per day. Not much traffic, but it's *very* targeted and those terms cost between $3 and $9 on Adwords and are worth even more to a client of mine in the same industry.
All your base are belong to
All your base are belong to us
All your base are belong to
This is the last place I'd think to see a cheat code for Warcraft III lol