Richard Branson launches the Igor named “gogo” in-flight WiFi service

Igor named the new in-flight wifi service gogo (case study here). Below, Richard Branson officially launches gogo service aboard Virgin America.

Computer Tan finally launches, and it really works!

Download the app today at ComputerTan.com

Virus update: one million English words, and counting

The English language received its official unofficial one millionth word this morning at 5:22 a.m. ET. And, just in time for the coming Web 3.0 phenomena, the one millionth word is...wait for it...

Web 2.0.

Of course, "Web 2.0" being crowned the One Millionth English Word, and having the coronation at exactly 5:22 this morning, is just an estimate, made buy a website called the Global Language Monitor, "a Web site that uses a math formula to estimate how often words are created." I like that: words used to describe a math formula used to estimate how many words there are that could be put to use to describe math formulas that estimate...well, you get the picture.

According to the article today on CNN.com:

[Global Language Monitor] estimates the millionth English word, "Web 2.0" was added to the language Wednesday at 5:22 a.m. ET. The term refers to the second, more social generation of the Internet.

The site says more than 14 words are added to English every day, at the current rate.

The "Million Word March," however, has made the man who runs this word-counting project somewhat of a pariah in the linguistic community. Some linguists say it's impossible to count the number of words in a language because languages are always changing, and because defining what counts as a word is a fruitless endeavor.

Paul J.J. Payack, president and chief word analyst for the Global Language Monitor, says, however, that the million-word estimation isn't as important as the idea behind his project, which is to show that English has become a complex, global language.

"It's a people's language," he said.

Other languages, like French, Payack said, put big walls around their vocabularies. English brings others in.

"English has the tradition of swallowing new words whole," he said. "Other languages translate."

Certainly that's what Wordlab has always been about: swallowing new words whole...and then regurgitating them in new combinations.

Still, Payack says he doesn't include all new words in his count. Words must make sense in at least 60 percent of the world to be official, he said. And they must make sense to different communities of people. A new technology term that's only understood in Silicon Valley wouldn't count as a mainstream word, he said.

His computer models check a total of 5,000 dictionaries, scholarly publications and news articles, as well as billions of Web sites, to see how frequently words are used, he said. A word must make 25,000 appearances to be deemed legitimate.

Payack said news events have also fueled the rapid expansion of English, which he said has more words than any other language. Mandarin Chinese comes in second with about 450,000 words, he said.

English terms like "Obamamania," "defriend," "wardrobe malfunction," "zombie banks," "shovel ready" and "recessionista" all have grown out of recent news cycles about the presidential election, economic crash, online networking or a sports event, he said. Other languages might not have developed new terms to deal with such phenomena, he said.

That the true beauty and power of English, and its new global function: serving as a language laboratory for the entire world. An interesting corollary question would be how many English words die out every day, week or month? None of these new words get carved in stone, and even the Oxford English Dictionary is filled with many archaic words no longer in use.

Language experts who spoke with CNN said they disapprove of Payack's count, but they agree that English generally has more words than most, if not all, languages.

"This is stuff that you just can't count," said Jesse Sheidlower, editor at large of the Oxford English Dictionary. "No one can count it, and to pretend that you can is totally disingenuous. It simply can't be done."

The Oxford English Dictionary has about 600,000 entries, Sheidlower said. But that by no means includes all words, he said.

... Part of what makes determining the number of words in a language so difficult is that there are so many root words and their variants, said Sarah Thomason, president of the Linguistic Society of America and a linguistics professor at the University of Michigan.

... Linguists and lexicographers run into further complications when trying to count words that are spelled one way but can have several meanings, said Allan Metcalf, an English professor at MacMurray College in Illinois, and an officer at the American Dialect Society.

"The word bear, b-e-a-r -- is that two words or one, for example? You have a noun that's a wild creature and then you have b-e-a-r, [which means] to bear left or to bear right, and there's many other things," he said. "So you really can't be exact about a millionth word."

Can any of these linguists or word-counters bear to get into pun territory? Absolutely each meaning of "bear" and every other word should count as a separate word -- again, multiple meanings, puns, homonyms, all are part of what gives the English language so much flavor and customizability (not a word, BTW, according to the OED). Call it Language 3.0 if you must (but really, please don't -- I'm just planting a virus here).

[Payack] said the count is meant to be a celebration of English as a global language. And, while he says other languages are being stamped out by English's expansion, it's a powerful thing that so many people today are able to communicate with such a vast list of words.

Here here, brother. As William S. Burroughs famously said, "Language is a virus". And English, with its metastasizing foam of wordbirth and worddeath, is the smallpox of languages.

Bad font choices ruining America’s brand

America Is F*cked…….(Graphically at least) from Jess Gibson on Vimeo.

b2b to b2c - Discussion topic

We trying a first here, trying to start an actual discussion. How novel.

Question: Can anyone think of any b2b brands that have tried and failed at becoming a b2c brand?

Add your two cents on this topic in the Comments.

Next week: Conversing with inanimate objects, aka designers.

Activia: A mystery wrapped in an enema

Activia yogurt’s sales pitch:

Why should I Switch to Activia? If you have ever suffered from even occasional irregularity, then you should try Activia. Only delicious Activia has the exclusive culture Bifidus Regularis and is clinically proven to help with slow intestinal transit when eaten every day for two weeks, as part of a balanced diet and healthy lifestyle.

That’s the pitch; Activa relieves constipation in only two weeks…only two weeks… I’ll pass. Give me the Fleet with real blueberries, An Enema of the People. (sorry Henrik).

Recommended from on high

Wharton at UPenn and USC Annenberg School for Communication both chime in on The Igor Naming Guide.

Read more: naming companies, naming consultants

Igor’s creative director in today’s San Francisco Business Times

It’s a bad time for A-list biotech companies.

From Anesiva to Avigen, a number of biotech companies with names starting with an “a” and including a “v” are facing tough times. So is it the name — or the companies — that are not so sweet?

Avigen Inc. of Alameda will liquidate after a five-month war of words with its largest shareholders. Anesiva Inc. of South San Francisco, which on March 25 said it has enough cash to last into April, hopes to gross $3 million in a rights offering. And Avicena Group Inc. of Palo Alto, while holding on with $1 million raised from foreign investors last fall, was kicked off the NASDAQ bulletin board back in September and hasn’t filed a financial statement with the SEC since May 2008.

“So many biotechs started with that (“a”) pattern, so a disproportionate number are failing now because there are more of them,” said Jay Jurisich, creative director and cofounder of Igor Inc., a San Francisco naming and branding agency.

You can read the rest of the article here.

Read more: naming companies, naming company, naming consultants

Holy Invasion of Privacy, Badman!

Clever title, huh? Just Snark Hunting making a lame joke out of a cheesy pun? If only. Incredibly, the title of this post is, verbatim, an actual recent trademark filing by Sony! Here are the Goods & Services listed for this mark on the USPTO:

Video game software; Software for computer games; Optical disc recorded video game software; Optical disc recorded computer game software; Optical disc recorded game programs for hand-held typed electronic games with liquid crystal display

Gizmodo, which alerted us to this strange trademark filing, speculates on what it could mean:

Oh, what could it be? It sounds like it could be a trademark for the EULA or privacy section of DC Universe Online, the Sony-developed DC Comics MMORPG. Or something related to that game. How else is Sony thinking it can register the name Badman in any kind of trademark filing and get away with it?

That’s the gazillion dollar question: how can Sony get a trademark for “Badman” in a tagline that plays off the kind of Batman-speak bandied about in the old Batman TV series? Seems like whoever owns the rights to Batman wouldn’t take too kindly to this. Could this be the Joker’s dark wit? Maybe IP-Caped-Crusader Marty Schwimmer can get to the bottom of this.

Holy slap in the farce: This strange turn of events inspired me to look-up some of those phrases from the old show, and it’s amazing how downright wacky they are. Here is a sample to get your Dada groove on:

Penguin: Here comes the bride, all bagged and tied!

Riddler: Batgirls wilt just as quickly as other women!

Robin: Maybe you can bully an aging mogul, but not me, Catwoman!

Batman: I’m just going to hang around the bar. I don’t want to look conspicuous.

Robin: Holy bill of rights, Batman!

Robin: Holy haberdashery, Batman!

King Tut: If the caped crumb is here, the cowled creep can’t be far behind.

Commissioner Gordon: You know I’m violently opposed to police brutality.

Penguin [Organizing his election]: Plenty of girls and bands and slogans and lots of hoopla, but remember, no politics. Issues confuse people.

Catwoman: I’m not just pussyfooting around this time, Batman!

Robin: The way we get into these scrapes and get out of them, it’s almost as though someone was dreaming up these situations; guiding our destiny.

Robin [Figuring out a riddle]: The opposite of a girl is a boy!

Batman: Poor devil. Forced to live in an air-conditioned suit that keeps his body temperature down to fifty degrees below zero. No wonder his mind is warped.

Batman: Robin, warm up the Bat-spot analyzer while I take a sample of this affected cloth.

Batman: I never touch spirits. Have you some milk?

Chief O’Hara: When it comes to the human brain, we’re not equipped.
Robin: Holy atomic pile, Batman!

King Tut: [to Nefertiti] How many times must I tell you? Queens consume nectars and ambrosia, not hot dogs.

Batman: Just a second while I retrieve my beanie, my hair, my tweezers, and my notes.

Batman: I’ve just perfected an Electronic Hair Bat-Analyzer which may hold the key to this baffling question.

Batman: Oh, Catwoman, Catwoman, will you never learn?

Robin: Under this garb, we’re perfectly ordinary Americans.

Robin: I couldn’t resist. You were taken in by her, but I’m too young for that sort of thing.

Robin: Holy priceless collection of Etruscan snoods!

Narrator: Horrors! One lemon!

Robin: Holy oleo!

Catwoman: I didn’t know you could yodel!

Egghead: Woe is me, my criminal career is now egg-stinct!

Batman: Yes, citizen, you may return to your harpsichord.

Robin: We’re on official business!

Robin: Gosh, Batman, what are they dressed like *that* for?

Penguin: Well, I hope you have something special cooked up for that caped creep.

Batman: Let’s go, Robin. We’ve set another youth on the road to a brighter tomorrow.

Commissioner Gordon: Tanks in the street, a horse in my outer office… Has the whole world gone batty?

Shame: Your mother wore Army shoes.
Batman: Yes, she did. As I recall, she found them quite comfortable.

Shame: You big sissy, you couldn’t drive nails in a snow bank.
Batman: Why would I want to?

[Dr. Cassandra uses her alvino ray gun on Batman, Robin and Batgirl]
Batgirl: I feel like I’m getting flat!
Cabala: What a pity…

Robin: Gosh Batman, the nobility of the almost-human porpoise.
Batman: True, it was noble of that animal to hurl himself into the path of that final torpedo. He gave his life for ours.

There are a lot of gems here, but my favorite has to be, “Holy priceless collection of Etruscan snoods!” Can it be long until Sony files a trademark for it? [Sources: USPTO, Gizmodo, IMDB]

Finally, a networking site I can live with

Forget MySpace, Facebook and Twitter. There is a new network in town, and its user retention rate is unsurpassed.

See you there!