Naming Contest | Name The Bear Cubs

Name two new grizzly cubs at the ZooMontana.

Billings Gazette

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Naming Contest | Name Your Own Cocktail

Absolut Raspberri Vodka, Domaine de Canton ginger liquer and sour mix shaken with fresh raspberries, strained into a cocktail glass and garnished with a raspberry mint sprig shrew.

Name Your Own Cocktail

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Naming Contest | Name Your Own Scuba Site

Name a dive site in Papua New Guinea and win a week diving for you and your buddy!

Name Your Own Dive Site

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Naming Contest | Buddy The Badger

Frontier Airlines recently held a naming contest to celebrate its merger with Midwest:

The badger was added to Frontier’s family of animals featured on the tails of the airline’s jets after Frontier merged with Wisconsin-based Midwest Airlines under the Frontier name.

Wisconsin residents were asked to name the badger and, on May 28, Frontier announced three finalists: Bella, Buddy and Cookie. Then, Wisconsin residents were given until July 4 to vote for their favorite.

The final winner? Buddy.

ABC Denver

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Theater Naming | Redondo Union High School

A possible name change for the newly remodeled Redondo Union High School Auditorium has drawn the ire of an alumni group that says a new name for the structure would sever ties with its historical significance in the community.

Daily Breeze

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Company Naming | 16 Abbreviated Company Names Explained

My favorites:

If you go looking for Mr. P.F. Chang, you’ll be in for a long search. The Asian dining chain’s name is actually a composite of the founding restaurateur Paul Fleming’s initials and a simplification of founding chef Philip Chiang’s last name.

The Swedish furniture giant and noted charity takes its name from found Ingvar Kamprad’s initials conjoined with a the first initial of the farm where Kamprad grew up, Elmtaryd, and the parish he calls home, Agunnaryd.

Mental Floss

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Product Naming | Streamline Named Unified Communications Product Of The Year

Communicado, Inc., formerly known as SyncVoice Communications, a leading provider of management software for converged communications, announced today that Technology Marketing Corporation’s Unified Communications Magazine named Communicado Streamline Management as a Service Platform as a Product of the Year.

“This award from Unified Communications Magazine further validates the growing market demand for a solution to the IT challenge of making sure live communications reach the right decision maker without delay,” said Kerry Shih, Communicado Founder and Chief Strategist. “Busy IT teams are looking to their trusted local provider to manage their IP PBX, converged communications network infrastructure and unified communications software for them. With one predictable monthly payment, businesses can rely on a managed service provider using Streamline to handle their successful transition to an ongoing state of improved communications.”

“Communicado has proven they are committed to quality and excellence while addressing real needs in the marketplace. Unified Communications is pleased to grant Communicado a 2007 Product of the Year Award for their Streamline platform,” said Rich Tehrani, TMC President and Editor-in-Chief of Unified Communications Magazine. “We’re proud to honor their hard work and accomplishments and look forward to more innovative solutions from Communicado in the future.”

A full list of Product of the Year winners is currently published in the March, 2008 issue of Unified Communications Magazine.

About Communicado

Communicado (formerly known as SyncVoice Communications) is the leading provider of solutions for managing converged voice/data communications networks that carry real-time person-to-person business communications. The VXTracker software product line and Communicado’s field-tested Streamline Management as a Service Platform are used by more than 400 advanced technology adopters including Allergan, St. Joseph Health System, Tenet Healthcare and the Discovery Channel, to reduce business risk and lower operating costs, combining technical tools with business analytics. Communicado is headquartered in Costa Mesa, California USA and has sales offices throughout North America.

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Product Naming | Cosmic Crunchios

Tom Fishburne’s latest cartoon is on the subject of product naming. Check it out:

How To Come Up With A Product Name

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Nightclub Naming | If You See Us In The Club

Like any other exotic culture, Las Vegas fascinates me. The Los Angeles Times has a great story on the latest trend in Vegas clubbing — the exclusive pool party. With names like Rehab (at the Hard Rock Hotel — and clearly the best name of the bunch), Bare (at the Mirage), the Venus Pool Club (at Caesars Palace), and the Tao Beach Club (at the Venetian), these new “dayclubs” now make the Vegas “nightlife” a round-the-clock proposition:

Since it began in 2004, Rehab has transformed Vegas’ once-sleepy daytime scene into a “Girls Gone Wild” tableau of debauchery. Today, almost every major casino resort has nightclub operators managing its 21-and-over pools. They hire DJs to spin music and demand hefty cover charges. Rates vary by the weekend; on the cheapest days women pay $20, men $30.

Several resorts have separate “Euro-style,” or top-optional, pools, with half-naked women cavorting in the water. This summer, both the Mirage and Venetian — heavyweights in the nightclub arena — have unveiled re-imagined pools.

“It’s done a remarkable thing to the nightlife landscape,” [the Hard Rock Hotel's Jack] LaFleur said. “Day life? It’s hard to even categorize ! It’s finding those ways to generate revenue. For a town that’s been known exclusively for nightlife, this was extremely daring and off the charts.”

The gamble is paying off.

What will they think of next? Whatever your reaction, you’ve got to admit Las Vegas is a one-of-a-kind laboratory for destination branding. See you at the pool.

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Product Naming | The Worst Technology Names Ever?

Mincing no words, PC Magazine has selected The Worst Technology Names … Ever. In the Worst Product Names category, the winners (or losers, if you prefer) are:

  • DigiScent iSmell
  • Ogio Shling
  • Burning Love Pouch
  • Verizon G’zOne
  • Pentax *ist Series
  • Nintendo Wii
  • iMuffs Bluetooth headphones
  • Samsung Yepp MP3 player
  • Tivoli Audio iYiYiYi stereo system for the iPod
  • Zizzle iZ
  • Nabaztag (special mention)
  • Shuganano (special mention)

In the Worst Application Names category, their picks are:

  • Crush or Flush
  • Pikipimp
  • GIMP
  • eefoof
  • GigaTribe
  • Zamzar
  • Grazr
  • Reaktor 5 (et al.)
  • Joost
  • Gubb

Of course it’s a lot easier to mock a bad name (PC Magazine?) than to create a great one, but you do have to wonder what in the world they were thinking in most of these cases.

In the interest of fair play, here’s my quick defense of a few of these:

Although I suspect I’d have taken a different creative tack, strategically speaking the Wii name has done a good job of positioning Nintendo’s platform as the fun, “let’s just play” alternative to the more hardcore PlayStation and Xbox systems.

Joost is at least a better name than Skype!

iYiYi is clearly a play on the iPod brand and the Spanish interjection “ay, ay, ay” — something the PC Magazine editors missed altogether.

There’s nothing wrong with the Reaktor name; it’s a fine name.  Native Instruments, the creator of Reaktor 5, is a German company; reaktor is the German equivalent of reactor. Do your homework, PC Magazine!

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