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I wrote about this a few weeks back and got quite a few emails suggesting that I was "full of it" and must be joking.
Sorry. This isn't an example of my wild imagination getting the best of me. Pen Island is indeed a company that sell pens. If you click the link make sure you check the web address. This is an example of a poorly parsed name. Even Snopes - the popular urban legend debunking site - backs me up on this one. Parsing has become far more important since the late 1990s when companies began moving to the Web. Previously innocent names became potential landmines when the HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP) made the use of spaces in company names somewhat obsolete. (Sure, they could have used hyphens or underscores, but it is easier to remove a space than it is to add an unfamiliar character.) We've added a research project to our list over at Stokefire. We'll be taking a look at the number of companies that have elected to use names that utilize the Web format (must like "Stokefire" does) over the last few decades. Preliminary research shows a drastic change during the nineties, with usage increasing from a handfull of well known companies to being a recognizable trend on the NASDAQ exchange, the Fortune 500 list, and in Silicon Valley. With so many companies building Strungtogethernames we'd have thought that the practice of checking for parsing problems would become standard. I suppose that it some sense it has become standard since there are actually not very many companies with major problems. Still - the fact that anyone is letting these issues get through means that there's still some learning to be done. In our quick search we found quite a few examples (many of which we linked to previously, but through an external site.) The list of websites that sound naughty but aren't is quite extensive. We strongly suggest that regardless of how inoffensive the websites are you'll probably be offended by more than a few of the implied names. If you don't want to see them then please stop reading now and go here. Please note that we're guessing quite a few of these websites were chosen just so that they could get some press. (We really dislike this practice, as unless you're selling juvenile pranks the people that visit your site will be uninterested in what you have to offer.) And one last chance. You will be offended by at least one name here. We're pretty sure of it. At the time our links were made we believe that all of the sites linked were rated-G. They may be repurposed at a later time, though, so click at your own risk...
In closing, there are a few things you can do to avoid making the mistakes above:
If you know of any genuine sites that I've missed in the list above just post a comment and we'll add it in to the list. Similarly, if you know of other checks that you have used to prevent accidental profanity and the like I encourage you to let us know. Last: We once recommended naming a service company with three letters that also (coincidentally) were the name of a man that declared martial law overseas. We informed the client of the risk and they still selected the name because their target market wasn't familiar with the culture in question. The issue isn't complete avoidance of any issues. Avoiding every potential negative association is impossible. The goal with parse checks is to ensure that you're not creating unintentional or unacknowledged associations for your target audience. Armed with a backstory for the name and many pages of research, our client was prepared to answer any questions that might come up about existing alternate connotations. Unfortunately some names and URLs are so far gone that no amount of backstory can save them. (And yes... we do know that the word "toke" is in our name. We're not proud, but in our defense, no one has ever actually pointed it out to us - and we've never heard of an "S-Toke." Though now that this is mentioned we're sure that someone is going to invent a definition.) Tate Linden Principal Consultant Stokefire Consulting Group 703-778-9925 |
