What's in a name (for software and hardware)?

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Using Autocad the other day and it made me thing about this again. How important is a name in the world of software (and hardware)? Obviously there are loads of factors that contribute to success or failure but it’s surprising how often good names and success line up and vise versa.

By success I mean commercial success, user base, market share etc. NOT user experience, quality, capability or anything of that nature. Those are often in opposition.

Autocad is a prime example. Great name and huge success, a virtual monopoly on 2D CAD for decades. It’s the worst sack of hammered bat guano I’ve ever had the misfortune of being forced to use. However, in the early days, when nobody knew anything about CAD I would hear things like “It’s computer aided design and it’s automated! Let’s get it!” It also gave the impression it was the only option.

Some others that come to mind:

DOS - good name, made it sound like the only option - success.

Microsoft - great name, says exactly what it is in a catchy way - success.

Windows - great name, made it sound like the only option if you wanted “windows” - success.

Unix - really? Just say it out loud a couple times - failure.

RISC chips - could it be any worse? - failure.

Silicon Graphics - cool name - success for a while.

Apple - not going to comment on this one as I don’t want to get flamed. I’ll let you decide.

Amiga - I loved the Amiga and wish it had dominated but what a horrible name. Sounds like an action figure you’d give to a 1 year old. “Here’s your soother and your Amiga!” - failure.

Photoshop - great name - success.

Softimage - such great software but terrible name. “Softimage? Isn’t that what you get when your focus puller has a hangover?” - failure.

Alias - also catchy - success.

Wavefront - good name - success.

Maya - non-descriptive but catchy - success.

I’ll leave Blender out for the moment. Keeping in mind that this is mostly for entertainment and humor, not a serious study or topic of any sort, what were your favorite and least favorite names?

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Microsoft is a terrible name in my opinion. Micro? It’s small and it’s soft? :smiley: What is that?.. Impotent mouse genitalia?.. I mean those are the questions that I might ask if I didn’t know a company named Microsoft all my life and somebody only presented it to me today. It’s just impossible to judge them, because we are so used to them. It’s a word that I learned before I learned speaking English. Microsoft only means the company for me, I cannot judge how good of a name it is any more…

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:sweat_smile: That’s good. I didn’t think of it that way.

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An by the way - why is RISC a failure? It always sounds so exciting and dangerous to me :smiley: :smiley: Why are people using them if they are so risky? Maybe I need one. :smiley: :smiley: :smiley: Maybe it’s cool, because it’s risky and extreme?..

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Haha, try telling that to your manager (in a large organization).

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Should I call him? On my smartphone? Ironically, this would be done through a RISC processor in that case :smiley:

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:grinning: no those would be ARM chips I think…

And for Microsoft, as you described it, you could argue that it does still encapsulate the soul of the company.

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It’s funny, and I don’t like like Microsoft in a sense… But I don’t actually associate it to that. I mean… our lives would be worse without it… It’s still important and it’s a good company in a way… And I also hate it. But I also like it, you know what I mean?.. you did mention it’s not a serious topic, right?..

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Yep. Not serious. I do feel exactly the same about Microsoft. Like it hate it at the same time.

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I find people online often discus what operating system is the best, and I just watch it from above knowing that personally I hate every single one of them with all my heart and soul… But I still use Windows. There must be something to it that Microsoft did right. I mean for itself, not for the customers, but still.

I think Silicon Graphics is a good name. It’s really difficult to come up with a good company name when you think about it. I would actually use Microsoft as an example that it doesn’t matter too much. :smiley: Or even Apple. Would you call our company Carrot? Well, apparently it can be done. OK, maybe Apple may have a deeper meaning, as in forbidden fruit, but still.

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ARM chips are built on a RISC architecture.

The R stands for RISC.

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Haha, I know. They are RISC but they changed the name to ARM or whatever for what I think are obvious reasons. However some liked the name.

Sun Sparc chips sounded cool back in the day. However it also brings to mind a fire hazard.

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Well… before someone names things there are always abbr. …:

Uniplexed Information and Computing Service
Reduced instruction set computer

Or try to be smart and ad an advanced : Advanced RISC Machines or originally Acorn RISC Machine

…and sometimes they stick to it or something similar… well… and try to seach for: blender mixing materials… :grin:
Also those name mixings… they just try…(because they are engineeers and no name designer) :

Computer Software

Microprocessor Software

Software for Imagery (?)

Computer (Inforamtion) Servie

but also simple abbr. …
America On Line

or… you name everuthgin with a I

IOS IPAD IPHONE IDONTKNOWWHAT

You may know this telecommunitaion companies when also .com was something special (and would rise the stock price even when the compay does not have to do anything with electronics at all )

MobileCom
TeleKom

(just noticed the last also uses T-whatever…)

…so brand names are difficult… and sometime brillantly easy…

( I once read/heard something about Rolls-Royce wanted to name some model Mist …until they noticed that in german this means dung… )