China's official media launches search engine to rival Google

Known as 'Goso.cn', China's very own search engine has been launched by the country's largest newspaper the 'Peoples Daily', which is the official daily of the ruling Communist Party of China (CPC).

The state-run media already holds sway over the country where the flow of information is tightly controlled, and the move to introduce its own search engine signifies its aim to take control of the web media as well.

The move came as blog news is catching up fast posing a direct challenge to the hold of official media in the country.

Google was involved in a face-off with the Chinese government in March this year after it shut down its Chinese search engine and re-routed mainland users to its uncensored site in Hong Kong, protesting cyber attacks.

Google, which resisted attempts of censorship for many months later gave in and got its license to operate in China renewed only after it agreed to abide by all restrictions.
Months later, the country's largest newspaper has launched a news search engine which came after six months of trial operations, state-run English dailies the China Daily and Global Times reported.

The launch of the "People Search Engine" is part of authorities' efforts to enhance the CPC international communication capacity, Zhang Yannong, president of People's Daily, said.

Given the fact that most of the rules and regulations of the information industry were set by foreign companies, and that several countries view development of the Internet as part of their national strategies, China must develop a search engine with independent technology, thus creating a good Internet environment for 420 million, China Daily quoted a "netizen" Zhang as saying.

"The search engine is an Internet tool that obviously has ideological characteristics," he said.Deng Yaping, general manager of Goso Network Limited, said Goso.cn is a vertical search engine product that integrates news, news forums, pictures, blogs, videos and micro blogs.

Since its renewal, Google operated on a low profile in China and Google Earth Maps did not even take part in the bidding, leaving the floor open to mostly local competitors.
China has already launched its own version of earth maps which showed Arunachal Pradesh as part of southern Tibet.

Goso.cn is expected to go after local search engine Baidu.com, which expanded it operations taking full advantage of Google's problems.

"Users only need to enter key words and they will have a fresh news experience as Goso provides them with all-around information related to the topic," Deng told media during the launch.

In addition, the search engine can analyse the popularity of certain news topics, which may help media professionals, she said.Deng said Baidu Inc is a "formidable" player, especially after Google partially abandoned the mainland market earlier this year.
She said given Baidu's popularity, Goso.cn will have to develop its own unique style to attract users.

"The customer base for Goso.cn is still small," she said, adding plans to expand Goso's service to mobile phone users are on agenda but the timetable is yet to be worked out.
According to recent reports, Baidu had a 73 per cent share of China's Internet search market, while Google maintained second place with 21.6 per cent.

Market scale increased 57 per cent year-on-year to 3.15 billion yuan (USD 472 million) in the third quarter.

"Baidu will not lag behind in the competition," William Zhang, chief scientist of Baidu, said.
Cai Mingzhao, deputy minister of the Department of Publicity, said the nation's search engine technology still lags behind its counterparts overseas.

"We have to strengthen the development of the core technology of search engines, combine information dissemination and Internet security," he said.

The Institute of Computing Technology at the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) is assisting Peoples Daily in the Goso project.

Yin Hejun, deputy director of the CAS, said the academy and People's Daily are cooperating to make new contributions to innovations and applications.

"We are the people's search engine," Deng Yaping, the president of goso.cn, said
"It's a brand new attempt, with the People Search Engine exploring the types of news gathering," he said.

China has several commercial search engines in the market, including Baidu, but none are State-owned.

Yu Ming, a senior IT analyst at Dratio.com, said since the 'Peoples Search Engine' is state-owned, its search functions and results will not be influenced by growing commercialism, which he expects will improve its credibility, according to a report in China Business News.