I think they would be better off taking all they money they would potentially spend on this stupid and putting it up as prize money for a French startup to cre

I think they would be better off taking all they money they would potentially spend on this stupid and putting it up as prize money for a French startup to create a viable Google competitor--encouraging them to view search in a new way. In the very least, it would be a positive message rather than a negative one and maybe an interesting company would come of it. I don't think this will have anything but a negative effect on Google (which does not mean there will magically be a french competitor to jump in a take its place). It also makes the French government look really dumb...