Blog Archives

$12 million to get their own names back!

What is a name worth? The National Park Service (NPS) and their concessionaire Aramark for Yosemite National Park have announced they recently settled their trademark dispute with the former concession licensee Delaware North Corp. (DNC) for a mere total over

Posted in Branding, Consumer Goods, Hospitality & Travel, Naming News, Public Site Naming, Trademarks

When S evolves as an empowered Z – Sandvoort to Zandvoort

Formula One is rife in Europe but Barcelona, Spain has lost its place on the grid to the beach side track in the Netherlands, aka Holland -Zandvoort Circuit. Zandvoort has risen from the dunes as the Dutch eagerly awaits great

Posted in Branding, Consumer Goods, International Naming, Name Origins, Public Site Naming, Sports Naming

When Good English is Bad English

While recently walking in the ultra ritzy Ocean Ave, Carmel, California  I saw this sign on a gateway. Yes, I always notice strange and interesting names even on a mini vacation day. What I especially like is when they are

Posted in Consumer Goods, Famous Quotes, Hospitality & Travel, Naming News, Public Site Naming, Strange Names

Why is Pluto’s moon named Charon?

While all the world’s scientist are walking around in amazement about the discovery details of the former planet Pluto, I am thinking, “How did Pluto’s moon get the name Charon and what does it mean?” Luckily for me, the whole

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Posted in Name Origins, Naming News, Public Site Naming, Strange Names

Sony gaming site goes down from lack of a simple renewal

Over at Domain Name Wire Andrew Alleman reports the true facts behind why Sony’s Online Gaming site recently went down for over 48 hours – someone forgot to renew a key domain name registration! This is exactly why I  implore

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Posted in Branding, Consumer Goods, Domain Names, Name Origins, Naming Education, Naming News, Naming Resources, Public Site Naming

NSA is now the National Spy Agency

In the naming business we often have to remind and explain the pitfalls of initials when naming new brands or commercial companies. One of our common lines is to say leave initials to the government agencies – they have the

Posted in Name Origins, Naming Education, Naming News, Public Site Naming

Sochi is the name in the news this week

Unless you are living under a bush, the new name you will hear wherever you turn this week is Sochi, home to Russia’s Winter Olympic games. They could have just as easily called it the Krasnaya Polyana games, where all

Posted in Branding, Naming News, Public Site Naming, Sports Naming

Why is the Golden Gate Red? And Other Naming Questions.

It is that time of year to have some fun with naming. While your creative team conscripts are waiting for their probably futile brainstorming session to start, give them these riddles as a warmup exercise: Why is it called the

Posted in Branding, Name Origins, Naming Education, Naming News, Public Site Naming, Strange Names

Zuzax really is a place in New Mexico on famed Route 66

I recently returned from a road trip to Texas and came back along Hwy 40 that parallels (or actually is) the old famed Route 66 that so many pioneers took to discover the West. Apart from long, boring freeways in

Posted in Name Origins, Naming Education, Naming News, Public Site Naming, Strange Names

Regional Naming is Steeped in History and Folklore, but makes no sense.

Apparently there is an old story that Japanese pilots failed their training course in the USA because they couldn’t navigate to New England. They protested that it wasn’t a place and wasn’t on the map! So how come we instinctively

Posted in Naming Education, Naming News, Public Site Naming