QuickLinks For 2007-07-21, II

• EU Google Competitor Gets $165 million Kick Start:
  Theseus, a German based project that is aiming to develop "the world’s most advanced multimedia search engine for the next-generation Internet" will receive a cash injection of $165 million from the German Government [...]
  According to an AP report, the German Government will initially fund Siemens AG, SAP AG, Deutsche Thomson oHG and EMPOLIS GmbH to kick start the project [...] Theseus was inspired by a perceived need by European countries to challenge American hegemony on the internet by Google.
  Like just about everything in the history of Europe, France and Germany disagree. France is said to be discussing a similar subsidy plan with the European Commission that is aiming to deliver $112 million to a French Google competitor Quaero, a project previously supported by the Germans, which is led by French video-technology company Thomson.

BlogHerald´s founder Duncan Riley, creator of the unforgotten "thanks for all the fish, and I’ll see you all on the other side of the galaxy at some time in the future" after he sold the Blog Herald, over at TechCrunch. Finally he writes the good stuff again, now since June for TechCrunch.

Regarding Quaero and the back and forth, read the Wikipedia entry.

As to no surprise, french LTU Technologies is responsible for Quaero´s "process known as "image mining", software that recognises shapes and colours will be used to look for and retrieve still images and video clips that contain images similar to the query image".

LTU still showcases the old demo installation they once set up for some of Corbis´ RF images years ago.

Exactly a year ago I asked Corbis amongst other things about their strategy regarding Visual Search and "how important are visual search technologies really for customers of a large photo agency like Corbis".

Related:

• 'Quaero' becoming a reality (March 20, 2006)
• Quaero "really going to spread panic in Silicon Valley"? (Jan. 15, 2006)
• Europeans weigh plan on Google challenge (International Herald Tribune, Jan. 17, 2006)
• A New Google Rival Is Rising: Quaero, The EU Search Engine (Playfuls, Jan. 6, 2006)