Here we go again. While the rest of the world is busy worrying about actual problems—like economies falling apart or the climate collapsing—the **French government** has decided to fight the battle that truly matters: the war against **Zoom** and **Microsoft Teams**. Yes, you read that correctly. In a sweeping move for **digital sovereignty**, the great nation of France has decided that relying on American **video conferencing software** is a threat to their very soul. So, they are throwing them out. In their place, they are mandating a transition to a local, French-made program called “Visio.”

It is almost charming, in a sad sort of way. It is like watching an old man yell at a cloud because it is blocking his view of the past. The government claims this initiative is about “regaining **digital independence**.” That is a fancy marketing buzzword for saying they are tired of relying on American **Big Tech** companies. They want to be the kings of their own little digital castle. It sounds very noble. It sounds very patriotic. But anyone who has ever lived in the real world knows exactly how this deployment is going to end. It is going to be a UX disaster.

Let’s be honest about **government software**. It does not matter which country builds it. Government technology is universally terrible because it is built by the lowest bidder. It is designed by committees of people who probably still type with two fingers. When you use a SaaS tool like Zoom, you are using something built by a company that needs to make money. If their product breaks, they lose customers. They have a commercial incentive to optimize performance. A government tool does not have to work. You have no choice but to use it. If “Visio” crashes every ten minutes, what are the French officials going to do? Switch to a different government? No. They will just sit there, staring at a frozen screen, waiting for the connection to come back.

This is not really about software, of course. It is about pride. In Europe, and especially in France, there is a deep fear of becoming irrelevant in the global **tech sector**. They look at Silicon Valley and see Google, Apple, and Microsoft running the world. And it hurts their feelings. They remember a time when Europe was the center of everything. So, they try to build these little firewalls. They say, “We will not use your chat program! We will build our own!” It is a tantrum. It is a way of pretending that they still have control over the digital world. But they don’t.

We have seen this show before. Years ago, France tried to build its own version of Google. They spent millions of taxpayer dollars on a “sovereign” search engine. Does anyone remember it? Of course not. It failed miserably because you cannot build a world-class technology company just because a politician signed a piece of paper. Innovation comes from market competition, not from government orders. But they never learn. They just find a new project to waste money on.

Imagine the poor French civil servants right now. Their jobs are already full of paperwork and red tape. Now, they have to learn a whole new system that probably looks like it was made twenty years ago. They will spend hours in training sessions. They will struggle to log in. They will miss meetings because the audio latency is unbearable. Productivity will drop to zero. But in the halls of the government palaces, the ministers will clap each other on the back. They will make speeches about how they have protected French secrets from American spies.

And let’s talk about that **data security** argument. They claim this is to keep data safe. They are worried that American companies might peek at their meetings. That is a fair worry, I suppose. But is a French government server really safer? I would argue it is likely less safe. The biggest tech companies in the world spend billions on cybersecurity infrastructure. A local government project will have a fraction of that budget. They are trading a locked bank vault for a wooden box, just because the wooden box has a French flag painted on it.

In the end, this is just theater. It is a performance. The government wants to look like they are doing something big and important. They want to look like they are fighting for the people. But really, they are just making life harder for their own workers. They are spending public money to reinvent the wheel, but their wheel will probably be square. It is cynical, it is silly, and it is completely expected. The world moves forward, technology gets faster, and the bureaucracy tries to drag everything back to the stone age. So, good luck to the French officials with their new “Visio.” I hope they enjoy talking to themselves when the screen freezes.

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### References & Fact-Check * **Original Report:** [French Government To Replace Zoom and Teams With Visio, a Local Alternative](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/29/world/europe/france-zoom-alternative-visio.html) (New York Times, Jan 29, 2026). * **Context:** This move aligns with broader European Union initiatives regarding "Digital Sovereignty" and data localization (GDPR compliance efforts), though critics argue local alternatives often lack the scalability of US-based platforms. * **Related Topics:** Digital Sovereignty, Government Technology Procurement, Cybersecurity, SaaS Markets.