Tuesday, September 07, 2010

Baidu Follows in Google's Footsteps

Baidu, Inc. was created in 2000 and is ‘the’ Chinese search engine with some 75% of Chinese online queries. In April, Baidu was ranked 7th overall in Alexa's internet rankings and it provides an index of over 740 million web pages, 80 million images, and 10 million multimedia files. Baidu proactively censors its content in line with Chinese government regulations.

Baidu looks like it is following in the footsteps of Google and a look at their services start to look very familiar. They have now started an e-book adding 500 applications to its website. Readers will be able to read and store ebooks. Prices for e-books will be based on the agency model and governed by publishers but titles could be as low as 5 yuan (73 U.S. cents).

The company now intends to develop its “box computing” service, which links the delivey of content including books, video games and other entertainment, to online searches.

"Baidu" is a quote from the last line of Xin Qiji's classical Chinese poem "Green Jade Table in The Lantern Festival”. In ancient China, girls had to stay indoors and the Lantern Festival was one of the few times they could come out. In the sea and chaos of lantern lights, they would sneak away to meet their love and exchange promises to meet again next year.

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