Some Chinese Internet users aren’t happy with Google’s recently announced Chinese name, and they’ve started an online petition to express their displeasure.“We love Google, but we don’t love Guge,” said the message atop the NoGuge.com website, referring to Google’s Chinese name. By mid-morning on Monday, more than 7,000 users had signed the petition—a tiny fraction of China’s 110 million Internet users.Guge, which incorporates the Chinese characters for “valley” and “song,” is an allusion to traditional songs that celebrate a rich harvest. But many Chinese Internet users find the name just doesn’t sound right to them. “The name Guge makes us feel bad, it disappoints us,” the website said. “Google are you listening?”Among a list of alternative names for Google posted on NoGuge.com, the most popular was Gougou, a slang term for Google that literally means “dog dog.” Gougou received 2,774 votes out of 28,942 cast in an informal poll. The second most-popular pick was Google, followed by Goule, which means “enough.” Google addressed the question of its Chinese name in an April 21 post on its official Chinese blog. The post, written by a Google China employee named Cui Jin, said Google wasn’t defined by its Chinese name. Citing her father’s inability to remember Google’s name as an example of why Google needed a Chinese name, Cui said the name Guge finally allows him to tell people where his daughter works.She also offered one explanation for why Google didn’t choose Gougou as its Chinese name. “Gougou may sound like a cute name, but Google’s Chinese name must be a company name, product name, brand name, and a Web site name; Gougou is just not appropriate,” Cui wrote.-Sumner Lemon, IDG News ServiceFor related news coverage, read Google CEO Defends Co.’s China Censorship and Google’s Revenue, Earnings Up in Q1.Check out our CIO News Alerts and Tech Informer pages for more updated news coverage. Related content opinion Website spoofing: risks, threats, and mitigation strategies for CIOs In this article, we take a look at how CIOs can tackle website spoofing attacks and the best ways to prevent them. By Yash Mehta Dec 01, 2023 5 mins CIO Cyberattacks Security brandpost Sponsored by Catchpoint Systems Inc. Gain full visibility across the Internet Stack with IPM (Internet Performance Monitoring) Today’s IT systems have more points of failure than ever before. Internet Performance Monitoring provides visibility over external networks and services to mitigate outages. By Neal Weinberg Dec 01, 2023 3 mins IT Operations brandpost Sponsored by Zscaler How customers can save money during periods of economic uncertainty Now is the time to overcome the challenges of perimeter-based architectures and reduce costs with zero trust. By Zscaler Dec 01, 2023 4 mins Security feature LexisNexis rises to the generative AI challenge With generative AI, the legal information services giant faces its most formidable disruptor yet. That’s why CTO Jeff Reihl is embracing and enhancing the technology swiftly to keep in front of the competition. By Paula Rooney Dec 01, 2023 6 mins Generative AI Digital Transformation Cloud Computing Podcasts Videos Resources Events SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe