Naming, Again.

I came across this post at Scobleizer, a blog by Microsoft employee Robert Scoble, about naming products.  Here is an excerpt:

One thing I've noticed about Microsoft. We come up with boring names for products. Yesterday I gave Peter Loforte, an exec on the Tablet PC team, heck for the naming of the latest Tablet PC software: Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2005. 

Can you imagine Starbucks coming up with a name for its latest coffee drink like that? "The Tastes Like Last Year's Coffee, But Is Sweeter, And Is This Year's Version."

Compare the official Windows XP Tablet PC Edition, 2005's name to the code-name for the same product: Lone Star.

Lone Star is so much cooler. And doesn't try to communicate marketing information in the name. All of our code names are cooler than our product names. Whidbey, Longhorn, etc.

Let's go over to Nike. Do they try to name their shoes something like "Mike Jordan's technology, updated for 2005." No, they come up with wacky names like "Air Huarache" or "Zoom Generation" or "Shox."

Why does this matter? Because of word of mouth. Because of how our brains remember things. Be honest. Without looking at my previous posts or up above, tell me what the official name for the next version of the Tablet PC software is. Did you get it right? I didn't. I had to look it up on Web.

Now, without looking up again, tell me the name of a Nike Shoe. Get it right? I bet more of you did.

If you tell someone your law firm's name, can they repeat it to you five minutes later?