What’s with Thoof, Raketu, Etolos and Zoogmo?
I can completely relate to David Pogue’s latest column on NYTimes.com, where he rails against the latest moronically named Web sites, like Zoogmo, “Your Online Backup Community.”
Pogue doesn’t address the curious question of whether I want my online backups to be part of a community… it’s just the name he targets. What does Zoogmo mean as a brand?
“Could it possibly be true? Has all wit and cleverness already dried up in the naming of Web sites, less than 15 years after the Internet was opened to the public?” he asks in “The Dr. Seuss Jumble,” published on Thursday, Dec. 6. In the attempt to launch the next Yahoo or Google, he says, “These days, startups take the lazy way out: they choose goofy-sounding nonsense words. They think they’re being clever by being unclever.”
Pogue cites some new Web sites: Doostang. Wufoo. Bliin. Thoof. Bebo. Meebo. Meemo. Kudit. Raketu. Etelos. Iyogi. Oyogi. Qoop. Fark. Kijiji. Zixxo. Zoogmo.
Those Web sites, at least as far as I’m concerned, are instantly forgettable. In fact, I’ve forgotten them already.
The word Raketu (pronounce ra-ke-tu) is a declension form of the Czech word “rocket”. The sound of the word is also similar to pronunciation of the word “rocket” in Russian and Japanese. Please note that the word Raketu is NOT a mambo jumbo word. We chose this name not only because the visionary behind Raketu, G. Parker, is an astrophysicist, but also Raketu software will take communications and media the way we know it to another level.
Sincerely
The Raketu Team