[IP] French Government bans email.

[Dave Farber <dave@farber.net>]

------ Forwarded Message
From: "Trei, Peter" <ptrei@rsasecurity.com>
Date: Tue, 15 Jul 2003 15:22:10 -0400
To: "'dave@farber.net'" <dave@farber.net>
Subject: French Government bans email.

For your amusement, and IP's....
Googling on 'email courriel french' provides many
confirming reports - this is real.

Interestingly, 'courriel' turns out to be Quebecois
in origin, so the Academe Francais is just
replacing one foreign loanword with another.

The earliest online references I can turn up
are in 1994.

Peter
----------------------------------------

http://news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,6729751%255E13762,00.html

French Government bans email
>From a correspondent in Paris
July 10, 2003

THE French government, in a bid to turn
back the tide of English words in the field
of technology, has banned its civil service
from using the term "email" instead of its
approved French equivalent, the culture
minister announced.

All government ministries, websites,
publications and documents must now
use "courriel" - a shortening of "courrier
electronique" (literally: electronic mail) -
when they are referring to the messages
sent via the internet, the ministry said
in a statement.

The move, made law by its publication
in the official government gazette on June
20, will put the French administration
out of step with the majority of the French
public, who still prefer to use "email" to
communicate between computer accounts.

Agence France-Presse


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