France National Library Attacks Google Book Effort

An anonymous reader writes "The National Library of France is not happy with Google's effort to scan and integrate millions of books into its Web search. Jean-Noel Jeanneney, President of the library, wrote in an editorial that he is concerned Google's initiative to digitalize volumes at five leading libraries will reflect a unipolar worldview dominated by the English language and American culture. Jeanneney is pushing for European libraries to follow in Google's footsteps. Google said it was surprised by Jeanneney's remarks and noted, 'This is a first step for us; we can't do everything at once.'"

Comments

Great idea

[IncarnadineConor]

Hey, that's not fair! Rather than help you in your good idea, to make it fair, we'll bitch about it.

Re:Great idea

[Frymaster]

Hey, that's not fair! Rather than help you in your good idea, to make it fair, we'll bitch about it.

is it more fair for french libraries to donate free labour to google's for-profit venture?

there is a point to be made here about the state of the internet in general. nearly half of the world's population are indian or chinese. they have cultures and histories longer and deeper than that of western europe and certainly north america. yet, on the web those cultures are all but invisible.

history, it seems, will no longer be "written by the victor" but "written by those with a broadband internet connection".

Let's see if...

[Denyer]

...they're prepared to scan books themselves and contribute them to the effort.

Re:Let's see if...

[dfjghsk]

... and contribute them to the effort.

Why should a library donate its work to a for-profit corporation. If Google wants to work on this idea so they can sell more ads, then let them scan the books themselves.

Re:Let's see if...

[jdfekete]

Actually, the French National Library has already scanned a large collection of material: 70,000 documents, 80,000 images... mostly in French. They have been doing this for years and are distributing the documents from http://gallica.bnf.fr/

They are stuggling for funding and are frustrated that given the huge number of books they have, they cannot compete with a commercial initiative.

The European national libraries are full of treasures that noone can see, such as the manuscripts of famous European authors. Yet, the European govenments don't provide enough funding to just let these treasures out. I believe that's what Jean-Noel Jeanneney is trying to push, and the funding for this kind of initiative is not that large.

And, if American bashing in Europe is only half what French bashing on /., he may even get the funding this way!

Re:Let's see if...

[conradp]

The editorial is certainly a bit overly alarmist, but I don't really interpret it as "bitching"; rather it's urging the French to get their butts in gear and digitize their own libraries, lest history be written by the Angle-Saxons and from the Anglo-Saxon point of view.

Sort of like how the U.S. was "bitching" about Japanese productivity about 10-15 years ago and how we were going to get economically buried by Japan. That too turned out to be a bit overly alarmist, but it did raise some valid concerns that we needed to take a look at productivity and keep an eye on foreign competition rather than resting on our achievements and being economically complacent.

So if the French want to digitize their libraries too, more power to them. Or if they want to wait for Google to get around to it, I'm sure they won't have to wait more than a few more years...

Re:Let's see if...

[rduke15]

BUT EVERYTHING IS IN FRENCH! How the hell am I supposed to read it?

Funny. But hopefully not serious because you do know more than just one language, don't you? If French is not among the others, that's OK. But if you know nothing else than English, then I pity you.

French have a point there

[GooDieZ]

Can't argue with that concern.

Re:French have a point there

[Maestro4k]

Can't argue with that concern.

• It's a valid concern yes, but the way he's gone about it is making him, and France, look rather silly (again). It would have been better to note the development of Google's digital library initiative (whatever they call it) and then encourage other libraries to do similiar in order to foster better cultural exchange, etc. etc. online.

• Basically he seems to be trying to make Google look like a bad guy here. Google's response is quite appropriate, they can't do everything at once. I seriously doubt they want to stop this with just US libraries, they're a company and there's money to be made moving this into other countries as well.

  This guy needs to get his panties out of a wad and work harder at being productive. I don't have anything against the French and their tryng to promote the French language, but making themselves look silly is _NOT_ encouraging that, it's making other people distance themselves from all things French.

Re:French have a point there

[kitty tape]

Why does one French man's opinion make all of France look silly?

Re:French have a point there

[de la mettrie]

It would have been better to ... encourage other libraries to do similiar.

Indeed that would be better. But it's instructive to note the quite different plan of action that Mr Jeanneney proposes (my translation):

A multiyear plan could be defined and adopted at Brussels as of this year. A generous budget should be assured. ... By mobilising specialised laboratories, we will provide for the development of search engines and software tools that will be our own.

Mr Jeanneney's solution is a classical French top-down, command-economy approach. The European states, who of course know best what literature and software Europeans want, are to pour millions of taxpayer euros in a number of bureaucratic white-elephant projects that will likely have little lasting impact on the respective public appeal of Continental or Atlantic culture. Google, in the meantime, is set to provide a real public service at zero public cost, using all private funding.

Above all, it's the zero-sum-mentality of the French approach that I consider most antithetical to the ideals of both cultural and software development. Every Yankee byte, in Mr Jeanneney's mind, is an octet that is lost to European (let's be frank and read: French) culture. What about cross-pollination, incremental progress, forks and code-sharing?

Is this about culture at all... or just about de Gaulle's une certaine idée de la France and the generous budgets that go with it?

So whats stopping him from ....

[i.r.id10t]

SO whats stopping him from volunteering and starting to scan/digitize other works?

Strange...

[delmoi]

It's one thing to say "We should do this with French lit as well." but it's entirely another to say complain about someone doing it with English works. Given Google's efforts in other languages, it seems strange to me that they'd not continue their project in other languages.

Besides what is a French person doing complaining about things like this? The French are the biggest language snobs on the planet.

Re:Strange...

[remi2402]

Ok, I'll bite this one for a change.

I don't expect any slashdotter to actually even care for the original article (yes, the one in French) but just the summary ... let alone try and translate it with babelfish.

Here's basically what this fellow French dude says : Google, an american company, is trying to digitalize books, let's team up as europeans to continue to bring our own litterature on the web as well.

Of course his first few lines sound very anti american, just as the first few posts talked about frogs and all :)

This is not as much towards google as it is towards the French government and other EU countries.

Of course it "invokes French ire"

[SYFer]

Jeanneney's remarks are indeed anti-American. I don't see what makes him think that Google's efforts will "reflect a unipolar worldview dominated by the English language and American culture" other than the fact that it's being done by Americans. Indeed, he seems to like the idea itself but resent that it's being done by a US company.

Look, I know it's awfully trendy to be down on anything and everything American (and certainly there are things that legitimately cause concern), but frankly I'm more concerned that Jeanneney's anti-Americanism is affecting his scholarship than that Google's efforts (with the help of the libraries concerned and plan to be inclusive) is bad scholarship.

Re:Of course it "invokes French ire"

[Anonymous Coward]

And yesterday I was watching "Married with children" and God was there a lot of american assholes on this TV show. Why do you feel the need to be so stupid in your generalizations?

He is complaining

[Shnizzzle]

that more books will be more accessible and possibly free. If he wants more French literature to be available either start a company to do this or make it more interesting to Google. Does he point out that French universities were jumping at the bit to have Google do work at their libraries? Sounds like a lot of lot of pointless bitching to me.

French Bashing aside

[booyah]

where does it say, that an american corporation like google, has to promote all works by all nations?

or another american corporation site (like slashdot) has to some how not be american centric?

Me thinks the world has gotten a little too attached to our finger pointing. If you DONT like the way an established business is doing things, DO THEM YOURSELF! /rant

Jealous, I think

[Elranzer]

Maybe Jeanneney wants it instead to be a unipolar worldview dominated by the French language and French culture. They still seem to think they're a world power for some reason.

If his country came up with Google, then sure it's a case, but sorry they didn't. The best thing he can do is ignore it and not use it.

Of course he cannot force France and the EU to stop using Google, as that would violate their rights of freedom, which is somewhat more flexible than the United State's Bill of Rights lately.

Re:A little bit sore perhaps

[BarryNorton]

International language for business, yes, but French literature (and indeed German) is to be treasured and I, for one, agree that this should be acknowledged...

div style="journalism-color:yellow;"

[American AC in Paris]

"France National Library Attacks Google Book Effort"? What?

If you'd have bothered to read the editorial, you'd find that "attack" is perhaps not the most appropriate word to use. Rather, M. Jeanneney calls on his own country to get its act together and do the same sort of thing as Google for the sake of keeping the Internet from becoming even more of a monoculture than it is today. What, exactly, is so bad about that?

He's not attacking Google. His main point is "look at what Google is doing--we should be doing the same thing, for the sake of preserving our culture!"

Can the inflammatory headline. It's designed to get a cheap rise out of simple-minded people, and it doesn't make Slashdot look good. There's nothing wrong with what this guy is saying--and if he's attacking anybody, it's his own countrymen, not Google.

Re:div style="journalism-color:yellow;"

[808140]

I think you'd better stick to reading articles in the original language, and not count on machine translation to communicate something as subtle as indirect criticism. If you can't speak the original language, then maybe you ought to take your cues from someone who can.

I speak French, and I didn't get that impression from the article at all. He conjures the spectre of Americanization as a motivator, because increasing economic and cultural domination by America is a concern for many French people. Ultimately, he wants France (and Europe in general) to take greater steps to ensure that the culture of the world does not end up being uniquely Anglo-Saxon.

Google is as popular a search engine there as it is here (and I say here not knowing where you are, because Google is basically the most popular search engine anywhere). I don't think he or anyone in France is surprised that an American corporation would work to digitize English works. His point is that French/EU corps and governments need to follow suit, and I agree wholeheartedly.

Re:Don't panic.

[Rei]

Yes, naturally since France was mentioned in the headline, we have to cue the French bashing right away instead of looking at the real cultural issues being discussed.

The fact is - whether for right or wrong - France has long kept a strong interest in preserving their language. For a long time, American English attempted to do the same (that lasted up till the early/mid 1800s, on a less formal level - the rate of adoption of Native American words, for example, into English was incredibly slow during this time; British English by comparison changed far faster than American English). The French government, across administrations, has fought the adoption of imported words into their language.

This google initiative is - perhaps rightly, perhaps not - seen as a threat to maintaining the integrity of the French language. I think the approach called for was appropriate - instead of trying to force Google's hand, they instead called for European libraries to follow Google's lead.

Re:American Culture

[Elranzer]

No, Christianity has nothing to do with it. Nor does any other religion. Seperation of church and state, freedom of religion, remember? This is not the Religious States of Jesusland.

It's because of America's true religion: money. The church of ATM.

This is counterproductive...

[Entropius]

While having a "unipolar" worldview is certainly a bad thing, this reaction seems silly. Google's indexing is, admittedly, of more benefit to Anglophones than Francophones, but it's detrimental to nobody. If the French government (or a French company) wants a similar index of French literature, they should make it themselves -- and I hope they do, since free access to information is never a bad thing. But to criticise Google for focusing on works in their native language located in libraries in their home country for a new project, however, is silly.

However, it looks like he's mostly not criticising Google but calling for a parallel effort from non-English sources. This, of course, is laudable.

(Side note: I'm generally on the side of the French in these little Franco-American spats. I saw a SUV that had a "Boycott France" bumper sticker today, and considered sticking a note under his wiper that said something to the effect of "Y'know, you have the French to thank for the philosophy of free speech that allows you to show that sticker without danger of your tires getting slashed...")

Re:This is counterproductive...

[Entropius]

About the American companies:

I live in Huntsville, AL, whose main industry is military R&D contracting. This city makes its living off of American militarism.

I have never seen anyone as hawkish as some of these contractors. Most actual members of the military I know are either opposed or ambivalent to the war, or support it only insofar as they support their comrades-in-arms (and don't really stop and consider whether the conflict is just).

The contractors, however, scare me sometimes. Not all of them, of course... but the "nuke the sonsofbitches and let God sort them out" attitude seems much more common among the people who get paid to make the bits that do the nuking yet don't have to be directly involved in the process.

What a misleading headline!

[bodrell]

However his words may appear, Jeanneney insists that his remarks were not intended to be anti-American, and went out of his way to commend the short-term effects of Google's work as a "Messianic dream" that would "profit" under-privileged populations.

It sounds to me like more of a criticism of France's lack of effort of digitize French books than an attack on Google. It's a call-to-action for the French (or non-English) speakers to follow Google's lead if they don't want their languages to become irrelevant. It would be bad for everyone (those who speak English, French, or Swahili) to ignore non-English books, but I don't think Google plans to stop with digitizing American libraries.

Re:What a misleading headline!

[hellgate]

Exactly. In fact, the actual article on Le Monde talks about how great Google's vision is, noting though that it puts French at a disadvantage. He's neither criticizing Google, nor is he asking the company to change their selection. He ends with an appeal to the French and Europeans: "We can do it, therefore we must do it."

If you want to bash the French, you can make fun of his suggested solution (call for the European states to chip in for doing the same in Europe).

Not that kind of book

[grahamsz]

I think the effort should be to digitize older material first.

Firstly there's a lot of very valuable information which is in the public domain, which makes the legal issues go away.

Secondly, a lot of said information is in danger of being lost. The national libraries of our various countries hold one-of-a-kind books. One fire and they could be lost forever.

Publishers will probably have to start supplying the text of their books to google/amazon to keep their sales up.... some are doing it already.

Typical Lame Soundbite

[fm6]

The kneejerkism is only apparent if you stop at the stupid ("FNL Attacks Google!") Slashdot headline or the also-stupid Betanews headline ("Google Book Effort Draws French Ire!"). Neither of which seems be based on the actual article, which says,

However his words may appear, Jeanneney insists that his remarks were not intended to be anti-American, and went out of his way to commend the short-term effects of Google's work as a "Messianic dream" that would "profit" under-privileged populations.

Plus, the response Jeanneney is advocating is not to demand that Google cute it out, but to match Google's efforts in non-English libraries.

Hoh! Hoh! Hoh!

[SwimsWithTheFishes]

I think his concern should be addressed a serious concern about an on-going problem. As France continuous to become less and less influencial in world affairs and culture, we all lose. If the culture that once France is lost because of whatever reasons, we all lose a great deal. Voltare, Descartes, Napolean (a tryant but still a mover and shaker), The French Revolution, Lafeyette...it's a big list! His attitude deserves a great big wake up call, or a spanking. One or the other. Sillie Americon with yourre littlee boooks. Nowa go away ora I willa taunta yoou a seconda timea!

Re:A little bit sore perhaps

[Amiga Trombone]

International language for business, yes, but French literature (and indeed German) is to be treasured and I, for one, agree that this should be acknowledged...

Well then, feel free to acknowledge and treasure it - on your own dime and with your own effort.

But I figure if Google is footing the bill for this, they're entitled to treasure and acknowledge whatever they damn well please, or not.

All France bashing aside...

[Tristandh]

All discussion seems to be limited to childish and pathetic "they will surrender" jokes or other rants. Consider this:
If Google archives US libraries, there would be a bias towards english literature. I don't think many would disagree. And whatever is on google gets spread lightning fast, unlike (e.g. french) paper libraries. So the man has a point in pointing out this possible bias.
Oh yes, to all those idio^H^H^H^Hposters saying 'then do it yourself': A large profit driven company like Google would have the proper resources to do this. A librarian wouldn't. (I know, oversimplification).

English isn't dominant either...

[spectrokid]

Yes the dude makes himself look ridiculous. But I would like to oppose the "english is dominant" view. It is not the English language which dominates this planet, but a small subset of it. "Communication English", spoken all over the world, contains only a fraction of vocabulary and grammar of "the real thing". And people who can show you the way in Bejing most probably have read neither Shakespare nor any of the more modern classics. So starting to digitise English litterature is really not as "normal" as you might think. I am not French, but I can speak it. And I can tell you this: the French language has song lyrics which make John Lennon look like a guy from "star for an evening". Yup the frenchkies should get their act together and start digitising themselves, no Shakespare does not rule the world.

I have a problem with this

[NYTrojan]

Google is company located in the United States. The fact that people around the world use it does not change the fact that Google is a US company. It is their choice what language they provide content in.

If a French company became the world wide source for information I see no reason why they should be attacked for providing content in anything but French. Don't attack google for being successful here. Instead why not try to help some business in your own borders.

Is Google burning books?

[hsmith]

No, France now STFU!

On a serious note, this is no worse than the gutenburg project trying to digitize books, it should be an effort undertaken to make books more easiliy accessable. Not everyone can lug around 20 books, why not use a portable device to read! It is progression, you saw the church throwing a fit when Gutenburg invented the printing press because they couldn't control people anymore. Same deal, hundreds of years later.

RTFA: The article makes no such insinuations

[Catskul]

While there is a slight hint of counter-americanism in the article, I did not see any particular attack on google. It seems to me the article was simply warning that they need to get off their butts if they dont want the only publically available resources to be from english speaking perspective.

Google translated article (see:irony)

Re:RTFA: The article makes no such insinuations

[boule75]

Completely wrong. The court actions were not triggered by the French government but by French private companies, Jewish defense groups or anti-racism groups.

France is a democratic country and one can raise a case before a court, thank you.

Re:Don't panic.

[KiloByte]

France has long kept a strong interest in preserving their language.

I'm afraid that they take it to the point of being absolutely nazi.

An example: a friend of mine, an archaeologist, deals with archeological literature in a multitude of languages. The two most prevalent ones are English (for obvious reasons) and German (as germans have a surprisingly big representation in archaeology). Still, the international community has no problems talking to each other -- with a standing out exception, the french. French scientists are not allowed to write publications in any language other than French. Who cares if the bulk of potential attendees to a conference doesn't speak that language? The french government (and unfortunately, a sizeable part of the society) pursues interoperability as strongly as MicroSoft...

Another example: a few years ago, out of a sudden, the french government decreed that the word e-mail is to be forbidden and replaced with made-up "courriel". They are forcing their own citizens to be xenophobic!

On the other hand, English keeps borrowing words from other languages on a massive scale -- and this is one of reasons of its success.

That was the whole dang point of his remarks

[ianscot]

Ahem. Reading the article -- leaving alone the editorial, which I can only stumble through en Francais:

In the subsequent weeks after the editorial was published, Jeanneney has toned down his statements made in the French media, but remains the leading proponent for mobilizing funding for the digitalization of European libraries. A Google spokesperson told BetaNews that Jeanneney's remarks were a reflection of his fundraising efforts.
(That's my emphasis.)

The whole point of the guy's editorial was: if English language works are the only ones that become searchable this way, that's going to make those works more influential. He's trying to get funding to do exactly what you're talking about -- granted, not to give to Google gratis.

I love how /. readers who didn't even bother reading the story are now accusing him of cultural bigotry, though. Very edifying -- though not in the way our posters intend. It's not like the guy is, oh, a librarian who actually considers what he's saying because he's trying to provoke a response in order to get funding, or anything. Must just be jealous of America. Yeah, that's it...

Misleading summary

[quake74]

As much as I don't like defending France, the summary is misleading.

Mr. Jeanneney is not angry at Google. Actually he pointed out that the European Union (and France in particular) must follow Google's example and put on the Web the their own libraries so that it will be easy to access the works in not only english language, but also in french, italian, spanish and what not. I agree with him when he says that the preponderance of any single culture (in this case the Anglo-Saxon) is a BAD THING.

Actually the BNF already started with Gallica but there must be a common european effort.

And the people from Google should actually have read the editorial before answering questions.

Re:why does france hate google?

[TrappedByMyself]

France is still bitter about English being tagged over French as the international business language.
This is just backlash. Expect more.

Re:Americans already hate France (OT)

[American AC in Paris]

From my experience, they don't. They even wonder why we Americans think that the French hate us. They were really confused by the freedom-fries debacle. OTOH, the Parisians are different, and more difficult, but that's not just towards Americans.

My own experience is a few years stale, but I'll echo this. Parisians do come off as brusque and cold, but I have a theory as to why this is.

When the city you live in is home to several million people and the population density hovers around 25,000 people per square mile, personal space becomes very, very valuable. To this end, you don't want to interact with each of the hundred-odd strangers you pass in the street on your daily commute; you'd be nodding, greeting, and interacting every step of the way. Now, once you actually 'break the ice' and start talking to somebody, they tend to be amazingly friendly and accomodating--it's just that most folks in Paris value their privacy and understand that it makes everybody's life a little easier if we're not all waving, gawking, and engaging strangers in small talk all the time. For what it's worth, it works--I could stand in a metro car literally packed with other Parisians and feel like I had my own little personal space. You really need that kind of thing in such close quarters--you'd go nuts otherwise.

Re:why does france hate google?

[bonch]

It was exactly my first thought. This is coming from the same country that thought "email" wasn't French enough and actually created their own term for it that was more "distinctly French" (actual quote).

I don't care what your politics are or how you feel about Europe. A lot of France is full of stuck-up idiots. And Americans are criticized for thinking they're the center of the planet? Hell, we'll use words from any language as long as they stick. Oi.

Re:Compete instead of Complain

[Rei]

If you'd read a translation of the librarian's editorial, that is precisely what he said. They *don't* have the sort of money that Google has for this task, and he wants to change that. That was the whole purpose of the editorial.

Re:A little bit sore perhaps

[superpulpsicle]

Look, I am American. I think we need to make more friends around the world, period. If you were a retired WWII vet, I can understand your hate for japanese, germans, french etc. Completely.

What I have a problem with is the huge population of Americans developing a hate toward other nations by default. Brainwashed by TV/media etc. Vice versa French citizens shouldn't have this hate by default.

Re:why does france hate google?

[Goeland86]

I'm actually a dual citizen of both the US and France, and guess what? BOTH COUNTRIES ARE FULL OF STUCK UP IDIOTS! Get it through your head. The difference is that the American language is not regulated the same way the French language is. France has the so called "Academie Francaise" which defines the official french dictionary definitions and which terms are what. The fact that the people in that institution are old and old-fashioned (they don't even write using ball point pens, which I find preposterous, they use goose feathers instead) is just secondary to the importance of such institution. The fact is that France, because of the Academie Francaise, is preventing language degeneration, unlike in the US, where any word you want you can put in a dictionary and people will start to use it. Spelling is also an issue. French and English both have roots that go back very far, but English has evolved and degenerated so much that in fact there are now at least two english languages: American english and British english, with different spelling and grammar rules. French is still very much held together, and the ethymology of French words is easier to retrace, because in many cases the spelling still reflects the origin of a given word. Now, to answer your stupid post about French hating google, that's not even true. Afore-mentioned Academie Francaise has included "googler" as an official vocabulary verb with all it's declinations in all tenses in their official dictionary about three years ago. Also note that the reason I don't like jokes about French is because people in France always made jokes about Americans. I hate discrimination both ways, not just one way. I got my French classmates to not joke about Americans, I hope I can get my American classmates to not joke about French people. It's just a matter of respect.

Re:why does france hate google?

[boule75]

You do not have to. France does use Google and Jeanneney too. We do not hate Google and neither does he.

He simply points out that the effort led by Google, if is successfull, will once again be a powerfull tool to strengthen English (and US thinking) as the dominant cultural reference, and that this is a threat for all other cultures that imperils them a bit further.

He just calls for his European colleagues to join an effort to accept the challenge and match it in our European way, which does not always goes through private companies, although it often does. As far as I understand Google's reaction from the linked article, they do understand his point of view. I rather trust Google, but I understand what Jeanneney means and I approve his call.

How on earth does it come that any call for a non-american effort is immediately labeled as a threat to America? Why are so many Americans surprised when one states out that the disapearance of local cultures in the mainstream medias (TV, movies, Internet, scientific publications...), because they are overwhelmed by US might, is a pity, a loss to the entire humanity?

Fortunately, GwBush has just saved the French fries from oblivion. But French bashing continues unabated.

Re:A little bit sore perhaps

[conradp]

Look, I am American. I think we need to make more friends around the world, period. If you were a retired WWII vet, I can understand your hate for japanese, germans, french etc. Completely.

Uhm, one of those three is not like the others...

Re:why does france hate google?

[Anonymous Coward]

You constantly use the word degenerate.

Why do you and the French insist that languages are static and worthy of preservation?

You realize that all languages change throughout time, right?

By your logic, if a language changes in a given culture, then it's not evolving, but degenerating?

Can you take a wild guess as to why the French are viewed as being stuck up?

Re:why does france hate google?

[Bozzio]

The French are a problem no matter where they are in the world.

You give one example!
We ALL know that there is ALOT wrong with the Quebec government. There is a whole lot of brainwashing done in the school system in that province. This in mind, you have to realize that it's not all the francophones in Quebec who are like this! It's not the entire population of Quebec that is totally nuts. Stop generalizing. Stop making comments you don't back up.

Re:why does france hate google?

[jridley]

The fact is that France, because of the Academie Francaise, is preventing language degeneration

I think you misspelled evolution there. Had the Academie been in place for 10,000 years, frenchmen would still be grunting.

Who would have thunkit...

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow. The French have something against an American company for doing things in english. Now that comes as a shock to me. I thought the years of anti-American propaganda and superfluous legislation to eliminate the english language within their borders were signs of love and affection.

I guess it would be different if Google was publishing texts in Turkish or Arabic, that might be sponsor-worthy to the French.

No. Simply put, the French are the inferiority complex of the world. They desperatly try to impress themselves upon the rest of the Western World to say "We're important too". Sadly, they are about 60 years too late on that call. Even more sad, it will probably be another 60 before they realize it.

Maybe instead of bitching so much about how they are left out by English speaking world, they might try doing something about it. If Google puts libraries on thier site, maybe SurrenderMonkey.fr should do the same, tit for tat. Or better yet, do something inventive, original, and progressive that proves the French are still important and not just a society in the death throws of obselence.

English is the modern Latin. At one time, all international trade was done in Latin, so everyone could at least speak one common trade tounge. English is the defacto common trade tounge of the modern era. If everyone speaks/reads english, then we have a common basis for sharing information across national borders. And for the most part, the world does this, except the bitchy French who would rather pretend that they can maintain thier pedigree though dogma in an era of increasing homgeneity. Meanwhile, the rest of the world progresses polyligualy.

So, I say unto the French, lighten up and enjoy the one true legacy you have given to the world... have a French Fry. (You can find them at a McDonalds near you!)

Re:They just don't like Google...

[SlayerofGods]

Napoleon?

"Domination Ecrasante" of the USA

[Astolpho]

I've seen two types of apologist posts supporting this article, no doubt seeking to mine that tendency on /. that rewards contrarian posts with karma points.

The first type of post argues that the author is just trying to motivate the French government to launch a digitization effort for French books. That's all fine and dandy folks, but this article is being, and should be, judged on the basis of its text, not the golden intent behind it. The author alleges, and this is almost a perfect translation, the threat of an American stranglehold on the world of ideas. The "money-shot" here is when the author wrote: "Voici que s'affirme le risque d'une domination écrasante de l'Amérique dans la définition de l'idée que les prochaines générations se feront du monde." I don't care what he is trying to accomplish -- that is anti-americanism, pure and simple.

The second type of posts have argued that the author did not attack Google's initiative at all. Bullshit. The people espousing this point of view either didn't read the original editorial, or can't understand French as well as they think. The author followed a very popular line of argument among the French chattering classes: that the U.S.A. has grown TOO powerful, and that English is a lever by which they jiggle the world. (In this analogy, business would be the fulcrum). "Hyper-pouvoir" is the word practically coined in Le Monde, France's leading daily periodical for the grad degree plus set, and the anti-American editorials have flown fast and furious for at least the last 20 years. How French intellectuals manage to avoid noticing that English is actually spoken in other parts of the world boggles the imagination. Of course, talk to the average French teen who doesn't belong to the radical left, and they have no idea what the fuss is about. Unfortunately, it's the intellectuals that govern, not the teens.

Long story short, an editorial that talks about Google's initiative as enhancing the U.S. "domination ecrasante" (sorry about the lack of accents) over ideas is an attack on the initiative, not "yellow journalism" as one poster put it. The motivation may be noble, but it comes off as bigotry, and it's dead wrong. Knowledge isn't a zero-sum game.

Regards,

Astolpho

P.S. The most popular historical figure in France is Napolean. Now how could that possibly be?

Re:"Domination Ecrasante" of the USA

[irote]

Your interpretation is absolute nonsense. He describes the google initiative, praises it, and then makes the wholly valid point that they are digitising collections in English and American (the French say Anglo-Saxon) libraries.

The rub: works in English reflect a particular English-language discourse. English-language authors read other English-language authors, to some extent reflect each other's views, and thus there emerges a kind of 'standard' interpretation of events which differs from other equally arguable viewpoints held in other intellectual milieux. He makes the point that the French revolution was interpreted through an 'Anglo-Saxon' prism which dwelt exclusively on violence and the guillotine, neglecting its vast consequences in terms of constiutional theory and the development of the idea of the 'Rights of Man'.

All fair enough. A strong argument.

He then makes a concrete policy proposal. Here, he's addressing the French government and the European Union collectively: they should set up a similar, well-resourced initiative focussing on the other languages of the EU. This is a way of propogating and supporting discourses which might otherwise be drowned out in an overly English web. He's not saying that the world should be forced to read Bourdieu, just that Greek, Hungarian or Dutch scholars' works should be at least as easily accessible as English ones.

He doesn't miss the point that English is spoken in other parts of the world at all. He points out that the Bodleian, Oxford's university library, is also involved in the project. This is the point about his argument I would dissent from - and this is perhaps the real déformation scolaire that characterises French intellectuals.

There is no 'Anglo-Saxon' world. England, Scotland, Ireland, India, Jamaica, Kenya are very different in cultural attitudes from the United States. I'm English, and my 'intellectual milieu' is far closer to that of your typical French énarque or a denizen of the Max Planck institute than it is to the average American intellectuals'.

So his concerns about Google are valid. If they want to respond to it seriously and don't want immediately to start with other languages then they should do so by making a commitment to digitising libraries elsewhere in the 'Anglo-Saxon' (really English-speaking) world. A commitment to digitising the production of India's, Singapores's or Ireland's vastly productive academia would be a good start.

It's hyperpuissance not 'hyper-pouvoir', by the way. And domination écrasante doesn't really mean 'crushing dominance' - that's just an artifact of French literary style. French writing tends to opt for a somewhat baroque style of self-expression, and here he's saying simply that English is, overwhelmingly, the language of the web and academic discourse. You wouldn't contest this, I assume? And it hardly seems underhand of the French to want to promote works in their own language!

Re:why does france hate google?

[Rakishi]

Two words: Freedom Fries ... I guess "French Fries" wasn't American enough so we had to make our own word.

Re:why does france hate google?

[Rakishi]

Spimming is faster and easier to say/write than "instant message spamming." Actually why do you object to spimming but not to spamming? Making new words to express phrases is a natural process which makes it easier to communicate, and the purpose of language is to aid in communication.

Re:why does france hate google?

[rk]

So, "spimming" is bad because it means "instant message spamming", where "spam" was originally a trademark of Hormel until 10 years ago when it was used to refer to commercial crossposting to Usenet? Why do you support the lazy use of "spamming" when it would be more correct to say "The transmission of unsolicited commercial language by text messaging services"?

Your rules appear to be pretty damned arbitrary.

American company

[NickDngr]

Google is an American comapany. If France doesn't like it, they can create their own database. Boo f-ing hoo.

Re:why does france hate google?

[cayenne8]

" I'd say the English are more bitter over the raping the USians have given to the Queens tongue."

Not to mention there's no such thing as an Usian....

Now that is a NEW word that does not need to be promulgated....sounds like you're doing a bit of raping to the Queen's tongue yourself...

Re:A little bit sore perhaps

[slacktide]

Never heard of the Vichy French government?

Re:MOD PARENT UP

[Goeland86]

it's degenerating mostly now because people coming into college are losing grammar and spelling skills. I don't know if it's just because they think it's cool or what, but they're losing all the fundamentals that were left of the english language before the internet boom. I'm still in college, and not an english major, but even some of my professors get annoyed at my pickiness with spelling. There's a reason words are spelled a certain way, and I don't see why people think they can ignore the rules. They do respect the road's rules, no? Why not the same with language?
There's a reason for rules to exist, and people ignoring rules is a problem.

I've never read Chaucer, but I do know for a fact that France is the only country to have such an institution.

This is where you miss the boat

[Anonymous Coward]

If you equate stupid college freshmen with poor grammar and spelling habits with the state of the English language as a whole, then I completely understand your position vis a vis the degradation of the English language. I even agree with your use of the word 'degradation.'

However, my friend, there is hope. The evolution of the English language that I've spoken of so much is not lead by clueless college freshmen. See, there's a big difference between evolution of the language and stupid misuse. The difference is in the volume of users.

While from your perspective (being surrounded by fraternity buffoons who can't spell "tomato" to save their lives) this may not be apparent, I assure you that the vast majority of English speakers are concerned with using "proper" grammar and spelling.

You may ask how one can possibly define what is proper in a language where you can make up the rules as you go, and that would be a very fair question. The answer is simple - it's determined by majority rule.

Stupid college freshmen are in the minority - and, perhaps more importantly, the way in which their "spleling aand gramer" differ from the majority is not standard. If every college freshmen in the English speaking world suddenly agreed to start spelling "tomato" as "tomatoe", then at least they would have a community within which their spelling of that word would be viewed as correct.

An example of evolution, as opposed to degradation, is in the word "healthy". A sentence which most people would view as being perfectly correct is as follows: "Be sure to eat a healthy breakfast, you've got a big day ahead of you." The usage of the word healthy here is different from what it was, say, 30 years ago, when the word "nutritious" would have been a more likely choice. "Healthy" is generally used to mean alive and well - however, clearly the speaker in the example sentence is not advocating that the person they're speaking to eat a breakfast which is still alive. But we all understand what's meant here (that the person should eat a breakast which will result in their health and physical well being), so using it this way is (in the English language) just fine.

And that is how the English language evolves, why college freshmen are not going to cause the downfall of the English language, and why your current perspective regarding the degradation of the language is ultimately incorrect.

Re:why does france hate google?

[Squirmy McPhee]

France has the so called "Academie Francaise" which defines the official french dictionary definitions and which terms are what.

The fact is that France, because of the Academie Francaise, is preventing language degeneration, unlike in the US, where any word you want you can put in a dictionary and people will start to use it.

Oh, please. Word definitions are determined by usage, not the other way around. People don't use words because they are in the dictionary -- words are in the dictionary because people use them. That is a universal constant of lanugages, and the only way to stop it is to have widespread buy-in from the people who use the language (as they do in Iceland, which puts France to shame when it comes to language preservation). That's far easier to do when the populace is confined to a small geographic area, as with the French spoken in France, as opposed to spread all over the world, as with the English that you are complaining about.

The Academie Francaise is an anachronism.

French is still very much held together, and the ethymology of French words is easier to retrace, because in many cases the spelling still reflects the origin of a given word.

Don't forget that the tiny island where the English language developed was constantly raided, invaded, and attacked by nearby armies speaking a wide range of foreign languages, not to mention that it was a permanent home to at least three other languages. With so many people speaking so many languages over such a small area, it is hardly surprising that English absorbed a wide range of foreign words.

Most important of these foreign languages, of course, is the French introduced after the Norman invasion in 1066. Since the ruling class spoke French after that event, English was debased and acquired quite a large number of French words as upwardly mobile members of the lower classes attempted to make themselves sound important. IIRC, French was the official language of the British Parliament until sometime in the 16th century. Aside from Germanic, French has had more influence on the English language than any other. (In fact, most of the influence usually attributed to Latin can be traced to French.)

In other words, the French did more than anybody to ensure a seismic shift in the English language. :-)

Also, don't forget that French is spoken outside of France, and few of those speakers care a whit what the Academie Francaise has to say about their language. Have a listen to Quebecois, Haitian, or Beninese French sometime, then try to tell me that French is not every bit as "degenerate" as English.

Gauling

[Doc Ruby]

This isn't France attacking Google - it's France attacking Europe, for letting an American company do all the work, and leaving Europe behind. That's called "competition", which we usually expect from Germany instead. France is just so stereotyped as dissing American supremacy that everyone's misinterpreting it as a personal attack on them. And, strangely, it's almost always worth considering whether a French attack is relevant - because when it is, it's very personal.

Re:why does france hate google?

[Anonymous Coward]

> English is the Lingua Franca of the world today.

He says, using a latin phrase meaning "The French Language".

Touche.

Doh.

Re:why does france hate google?

[jimi the hippie]

Have you ever actually tried reading something from 500 years ago? Here's a little sample from around 1485:
Pray you all gyue your audyence And here this mater with reuerence By fygure a morall playe The somonynge of euery man called it is That of our lyues and endynge shewes How transytory we be all daye This mater is wonders precyous But the entent of it is more gracyous And swete to bere awaye The story sayth man in the begynnynge Loke well and take good heed to the endynge Be you neuer so gay Ye thynke synne in the begynnynge full swete Whiche in the ende causeth the soule to wepe Whan the body lyeth in claye Here shall you se how felawshyp and Iolyte Bothe strengthe pleasure and beaute Wyll fade from the as floure in maye For ye shall here how our heuen kynge Calleth euery man to a generall rekenynge Gyue audyence and here what he doth saye.

Re:You seem a little confused.

[uhlume]

You're thinking of mutation, I'm afraid.