At what point...

...do cute company names bounce off the public consciousness.

I'm there already, are you?

Comments

• Anonymous
  February 16, 2006
  Seriously, anything that ends with "r" rather than "er" (ie Flickr, etc.) should be banned.  It would seem that companies are getting their company names from a "NameMCompanySomethingFoolish.com"
  
  I realize that it's the "hip generation" and that many legitimate company names have been snapped up by "squatters", but let's be real.  The reality is that one simply has to drop the following:
  
  * instead of "ed", just end with "d"
  * instead of "er", just end with "r"
  * instead of "or", end with "oor"
  * end your company with "-search"
  * etc. etc.
  
  BTW, if you don't already have a company name then just use the following to get that uber-name:
  
  1.  Brand Name Generator: http://www.whatbrandareyou.com/
  
  2.  If you're a "New Media Company" then use the following:
  http://adactio.com/extras/newmediagenerator/?
  
  3.  If all else fails then use the following name generator (includes Google check too)
  http://noemata.net/nbng/
  
  There's never a shortage of "quick fixes" eh?
• Anonymous
  February 16, 2006
  Or stick your hand into a bag of Scrabble tiles and pull something out!Or did I means Scrab*l...Scraabble.
• Anonymous
  February 16, 2006
  Actually that would be one of the following:
  
  1. Scrabl
  2. Scrabblr
  3. abbleScra
  4. ScrabbleSearch
  5. ScrabbleCaster
  6. etc
  
  
• Anonymous
  February 16, 2006
  Someone should alert Milton Bradley
• Anonymous
  February 20, 2006
  It is easy to be harsh regarding little companies you've never heard of, but not so long ago those companies included Google, Oracle, Yahoo, Microsoft and eBay.  At the time, all of those names seemed cute and were following the trends of the day.
  
  The things that matters with any coined brand name are:
  - memorability
  - how it reflects or embodies the brand essence
  - trademarkability
  - consistency of application
  - how much is invested to build the brand
  - the quality of products and services behind the brand
  - luck
  
  Whether you like a weird spelling like Flickr or not, it does have the strong advantages of being distinctive and trademarkable.  It also suggests a sort of friendliness or happy feeling - I personally think of fireflies and the times I have helped my kids catch one in a jar.  Not a strong product association, but it is positive, and with money and widespread use, it becomes a very strong brand name and trademark.
  
  If you look at any period in the past 100 years and the naming trends of the day, you would say that the vast majority of names were crummy, that they sounded or sound silly even today.  On the other hand, if the company or product was successful, it became a part of our language and everyday speech. We don't think twice about names like Xerox today, but when it was coined, it sounded and looked just as odd to its intended audience.
  
  If you don't like the current trends, start your own and see how difficult it is to come up with something that meets all the standards of a strong brand name.  The truth is, any name can be good or bad depending on what you're selling, who you're selling it to, and how intelligently you market the brand.  Unmemorable cutesy names usually get that way because the company either had a weak product idea, or poor marketing, or both, not because of the name per se.
• Anonymous
  February 20, 2006
  Well, there are still too may of them and the werid spellings don't help make them memorable for me. I don't need to start my own company to have my own opinion (that's what this here blog is for..whee!). And I am supposed to feel better about these companies because they have a weak product ideas or poor marketing. Uh, doesn't the poor marketing kind of lead to the names?
  
  I always bristle when someone says "if you don't like x, do y". Nope, don't have to. I can just sit here not liking it.
• Anonymous
  February 25, 2006
  The comment has been removed