The highly-publicized come-out of the new Vietnamese search player Monova has met with equally loud protest from the leading IT forums. Among the substantive discussions include
Monava: Một sản phẩm xuất sắc hay sự giả mạo lố bịch? (www.diendantinhoc.net)
Ra mắt cỗ máy tìm kiếm Monava (www.ddth.com)
Ma nguon cua Monava.vn (www.ddth.com)
However, the latest – and probably the hardest – challenge came from Tuoi Tre’s latest article, Monava: “Google Việt” hay tầm gửi?. Monova’s response is no less controversial:
“Chiều 15-1, ông Nguyễn Quang Huy, giám đốc Công ty Monava, tác giả chính của Monava.vn, phủ nhận thông tin cho rằng Monava là một trang meta Search, và cho biết sẽ tổ chức một cuộc họp báo vào cuối tháng hai, đưa ra database (cơ sở dữ liệu) để chứng minh Monava là một sản phẩm của VN chứ không ăn cắp của ai khác.
Sở dĩ, Monava cho kết quả hơi giống Google vì sử dụng thuật toán sắp xếp của Google. Có thể lấy ví dụ khi tìm kiếm với từ khóa “Hello”. Kết quả tìm được của Monava và Google sẽ ra không giống nhau.”
I’m not sure if there’s any misunderstanding or misinterpretation here. However, I would be VERY shocked if Huy really meant it because we all know that Google’s search algorithm is the IT world’s most complex, well-kept secret.
UPDATE: Nguyen Hoang Group fired a protest letter to Tuoi Tre.
January 17, 2008 at 5:26 am
Really disappointed to what Huy said. They are cheating people. Why they have a big Database like Google while using only 3 servers?
(Google is using thousand of server for Database, indexing, webserver….)?
January 17, 2008 at 5:36 am
Could you post a one-line summary of each of the Vietnamese passages that you quoted?
It’s impossible to understand what you’re saying if you don’t read Vietnamese (this is a blog for an English-speaking audience right?)
January 18, 2008 at 6:58 am
Here’s my translation for the Vietnamese quote:
“In Jan 15 afternoon, Mr Nguyễn Quang Huy, Director of Monava Ltd. (aka the founder of Monava.vn) refuses the rumor that Monava is a Meta Search Engine, and will hold a conference with reporters at the end of February in which they’ll show their database to prove that Monava is a Vietnamese product of their own.
SERPs of Monava and Google look like the same just because Monava is using the arranging algorithms of Google. But if you try with the search term “Hello”, you’ll see differences.”
the controversial phrase
January 18, 2008 at 9:31 am
I wish they can prove what they say about algorithms of Google, but I doubt they can.
I’ve had a quick look at source codes of this site (one of my friends sent it to me yesterday, not sure if it’s 100% true though presentation part looks quite similar to site public HTML sources) and found it quite simple, among the code lines I could easily detect Google search result (HTML) parsing function:
function http_post_request($p_url,$post_data,$p_cookies_file=”my_cookies.txt”,$p_ref=”http://www.google.com.vn”) {
…
}
So, don’t be evil (so soon), man!
January 19, 2008 at 3:59 am
[...] Khoa nói rằng sẽ RẤT NGẠC NHIÊN nếu Mr Huy, giám đốc của Manova.com, chứng minh được “Monava cho kết quả [...]
January 19, 2008 at 4:31 am
F.. it! I’ve seen its codes, just a type of proxy. Google would sue it if it’s worth so (not now, I guess).
BTW, Huy is a hacker and it’s not surprised that he thinks the hacker’s way!
January 21, 2008 at 11:06 pm
Nguyen Hoang Group’s response:
http://www.nguyenhoang.com.vn/?act=news&opt=view_detail&id=146
February 1, 2008 at 2:18 am
Interesting controversy. Like some of the members of ddth said, I see lots of html errors on the page.
Two other things I’m concerned:
1- Tuoitre’s reporters made the article sound biased. I see self-expression every where in the paragraphs. They quoted comments from forums on the Internet and made them more confusing. One line, they quoted Monava’s using shared server. The other line they said it’s a dedicated server. The reporters seemed to pull pieces of information every where and put them all together for whatever it becomes.
2. Did NHG seriously consider Monova when they decided to invest in the team? I doubt if they’ve studied the startup well. Their response to Tuoitre sounded like they’re vague about the team, about the technology that they are investing in. All they mentioned is the unseen benefits of the “product”. It’s $500k investment, or whatever the amount is, it’s still an investment.
March 30, 2008 at 6:24 am
Interesting blog post, anh Khoa. Theo em thì việc Monava có ăn trộm của Google hay ko ko quan trọng. Đơn giản vì Monava khó mà địch lại với Google khi ngôn ngữ của chúng ta cũng là ngôn ngữ Latinh. Còn với Trung Quốc thì khác hoàn toàn, ngôn ngữ của họ được cấu trúc rất khác biệt so với các ngôn ngữ khác trên thế giới, đồng thời cộng đồng người Hoa trên thế giới rất đông và rất mạnh!
Đồng thời, yếu tố xuất hiện trước cũng rất quan trọng trong thế giới net. Nếu Monava thực sự beat đc Google, em xin ngả mũ bái phục họ.
P.S: anh cho em add blog của anh vào RSS Feed trên site của em ở Pijaja nhé.
April 10, 2008 at 1:17 am
i cannot follow links to NVH papers. I am so disappointed while thinking of Monava. So i don’t think of it anymore
April 10, 2008 at 7:06 am
Hi, Neu lam giong google thi sao co the dich lai duoc google. Tuy nhien ngon ngu viet nam neu bac nao quan tam den search thi van co the chien thang duoc. vi google bay gio van chua hieu het duoc ngu phap cua chung ta. Bravo bravo. Tinh van da trien khai mot search moi de dich lai google day
xalo.vn
September 14, 2008 at 4:23 am
Đúng là thú vị, thanks all.
http://www.Onlaa.com