[openbeos] Re: Please stop this nonsense.

why don't we just call it the NoNameOS!! lol..this will be ok for
everybody..

regards,
 Valentin Chira

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Michael Phipps [mailto:mphipps1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
> Sent: Montag, 28. Oktober 2002 07:28
> To: openbeos@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: [openbeos] Re: Please stop this nonsense.
> 
> 
> >Hello Michael,
> >
> >MP> As far as unelected selections, I am not sure why you would say
> >MP> that. They were elected. By the admin team. Because I was not
> >MP> about to put 3300 names up on the website for people to vote on.
> >MP> That  is a waste of everyone's time. Stuart and I chose about 100
> >MP> names (weeding out BAnything, fake entries, ridiculous names,
> >MP> legally unusable names, etc). We put them up to the admin team.
> >MP> These are the 15 that they/we chose.
> >
> >But the way this second choice was done was a bit unhappy IMHO.
> 
> No one will be happy no matter what we do with this. 
> 
> >I realize that there was a time for name suggestions, and then the
> >suggestion list was closed and no new suggestions should be 
> taken into
> >consideration after that, OK. But then, in the "weeding out" process
> 
> Good
> 
> >down from 100 to 15, it might have been sensible to put more
> >consideration into the reasons *why* a particular name 
> should be taken
> >into the final list, what it actually *meant* (like "Nemo") and
> >whether there might be legal problems with it (if any Be-related name
> >is a problem with Palm, then "Indigo" is one with SGI [1]).
> 
> We did put some thought into it. A lot of thought. And, 
> honestly, the 15 or 
> so admin people had as different opinions as the general 
> community. Names
> are like belly buttons - everyone has one and no one likes 
> anyone elses'.
> It is sad, but true. One thing that people do need to realize 
> is that we ruled
> out anything 'B' themed. Hence the elimination of Plan B, 
> OS/B, etc. on legal 
> grounds. So for all of the folks who are suggesting that sort 
> of thing, well,
> I am sorry, but no. 
> 
> >After all, in marketing, this is what professional name designers are
> >hired for: to make sure that there are no legal problems with a name,
> >as well as to check out all the possible meanings of a name, even if
> >they didn't know them themselves - just because *somebody 
> else* could.
> 
> We intend to take the top few selections and do just this. 
> But why put all 
> of the effort into 3300 names? Or even 100 names?
> 
> >For example, in Germany, we've recently had the case of the VW
> >"Phaeton" luxury car. This car got some bad publicity, 
> because Phaeton
> >actually is a name from Greek mythology, from a legend where the Sun
> >god's chariot is being taken for a ride and utterly crashed in a ball
> >of flame. This name was dragged up and down the press as an extremely
> >bad choice that could have been easily avoided. As a result, there
> >were lots of articles about how bad VW's brand design works - not the
> >sort of publicity they wanted. People are aware of such 
> things, or the
> >whole "Nova" urban legend would never have developed. I don't think
> >you would want OBOS being mentioned as the "Nobody OS" just because
> >it's named "Nemo".
> 
> I can pick a dozen popular brands (in the US) that one could 
> argue against
> but have succeeded. Look at Whisk (a laundry detergent). Look 
> at what a
> whisk does - it mixes together. Not something you want done 
> with your clothes.
> Or UNIX (obvious). Or Cingular (a cellular company) - who 
> wants a cell phone 
> from a company whose name means "alone"? Truth be told, from 
> the marketing
> experts that I have spoken to, the name becomes associated 
> with the product.
> Most names are either meaningless words (Kodak, for example) 
> or vaguely associated.
> They become associated over time with exposure.
> 
> >And please don't say you or the admin team didn't know the languages
> >or mythology or didn't have the time to check all this out 
> by yourself
> >for 100 names. After all, this is what communities are about - shared
> >knowledge, shared work. I bet there's lots of people lurking here on
> >this list who would have willingly helped out at least about the
> >language bit. It would have been no problem to post a 
> narrowed list of
> >100 entries on the web site, along with a form for comments on each
> >name, specifically asking for associations with the name (such as
> >"dysis" with "dyslexia") or background info on the name (such as
> >"nemo" meaning "nobody"), and then do the final choice on that basis.
> >If new name suggestions would have come in, you could still have
> >ignored them.
> 
> Actually, the admin team represents about 6 languages and a 
> fair amount of
> mythological knowledge. 
> 
>

Other related posts: