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Sogou.com
Google's new pinyin translator was tossing errors identical to those produced by the Chinese site Sogou. It wasn't a coincidence. |
Chinese Internet users are up in arms against Google, which today formally
apologized for stealing a Chinese competitor's database and using it in their
newly released pinyin translator.
Pinyin is a Latin alphabetic transcription system for Chinese characters. Google Pinyin allows users to type in pinyin to generate Chinese characters.
The newly released system started raising suspicions last week, as Google's system produced errors similar to those produced by Sogou.com, a search engine owned by Sohu.com, a leading Chinese Internet portal. Last week Google got some benefit of the doubt, but this week it became clear Sohu was going to take action.
According to Wired, three days ago "Sohu demanded that Google stop using its Pinyin Input Method Editor dictionary and asked for an apology. ...Although Google still hasn't said how the Sohu dictionary came to be in Google's software, they have since removed it."
Just before Sohu held a press conference in Beijing today, Google issued an apology for using its competitor's database. Google now has a pretty huge PR crisis in China.
This Google gang is remarkable. They are, indeed, "thieves in...
