The owner of Pufferbelly Toys in St. Helens worries when Homeland Security agents show up on official business. Nothing about running a small store called Pufferbelly Toys prepared Stephanie Cox for a cryptic phone call from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
"It's all very surreal, quite honestly," Cox said Wednesday. "I thought it was a prank when I first heard. I couldn't understand why Homeland Security would be investigating a tiny toy store in St. Helens."
The call came in late July or early August. A man identifying himself as a federal Homeland Security agent said he needed to talk to Cox at her store.
Cox asked what it was all about.
"He said he was not at liberty to discuss that," she said.
They agreed to meet in early August, but the agent later canceled. Cox thought the matter had blown over when the agent called back Sept. 9 to say he was coming out there.
"I was shaking in my shoes," said Cox, who has owned Pufferbelly Toys for more than four years. "My first thought was the government can shut your business down on a whim, in my opinion. If I'm closed even for a day that would cause undue stress."
The next day, two men arrived at the store and showed Cox their badges. The lead agent asked Cox whether she carried a toy called the Magic Cube. She said yes. The Magic Cube, he said, was an illegal copy of the Rubik's Cube, one of the most popular toys of all time. He told her to remove the Magic Cube from her shelves, and he watched to make sure she complied.
The whole thing took about 10 minutes.
After the agents left, Cox called the manufacturer of the Magic Cube, the Toysmith Group, which is based in Auburn, Wash. A representative told her that the Homeland Security agents had it wrong. The Rubik's Cube patent had expired, and the Magic Cube did not infringe on rival toy's trademark.
In other news, the Department of Justice is vowing to get serious in the war on piracy, and will be increasing the number of FBI agents to sniff out copyright violators. "With the recommendations put forward by the task force, the department is prepared to build the strongest, most aggressive legal assault against intellectual property crime in our nation's history," Ashcroft said in a statement. It makes you wonder who's minding the store.
Posted by
abnu on Sunday, October 31, 2004 @ 1:53 PM
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Theory of Negativity: All the best names are provocations: Virgin, Yahoo, Caterpillar, Fannie Mae, Gap, Banana Republic, Crossfire, Igor. To qualify as a provocation, a name must contain what most people would call "negative messages" for the goods and services the name is to represent. Get the full scoop on the power of negativity in company names from Igor's Theory of Negativity.
Posted by
Jay on Friday, October 29, 2004 @ 3:19 PM
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Political pundits are trying to determine red states and blue states based on polls. Why no green states?
Crayola has decided on a new mix of colors based on a contest in which customers suggested the names for a new set of crayons representing each of the States of the U.S.A. Can you find your favorite state amongst these colorful names?
Yellowstone, Moovaous Cheese, Coal Miner, Cherry Blossom, Space Needle, Williamsburgundy, Maple Syrup, Bee-Utah-ful, Alamo a la mode, Tennesienna, Remarkable Mount, Chile Pepper Red, Lady Liberty, Grape Hatteras, Wild Prairie Rose, Rock 'n Roll Raspberry, Panhandle Paintbrush, Oregon Trail, Independence Indigo, Coqui Green, Newport Jazzberry Festival, Palmetto, Boardwalk, Old Man Granite Gray, Las Vegas Lights, Cornhusker Yellow, Big Sky, Archway Grey, Mississippi Mud Pie, 10,000 Lakes of Blue, Motown Blues, Boston Tea Party, Aloha Aquamarine, Tater Tan, Abe Lincoln's hat, Indianappleous Red, A-maize-ing Iowa, Yellow Brick Road, Fort Knox Gold, Cajun Crawfish Orange, Lobster Red, Francis Scott Kiwi, Heart of Dixie, Kodiak Bear Brown, Grand Tanyon, Hog Wild Red, Sacra-minto-o, Pikes Peak Purple, Nutmeg, First State Fuchsia, Alligator Alley, and Sweet Georgia Peach.
Crayola employees showed their patriotic colors, adding the following names to the mix:
Amber Waves of Grain, Purple Mountain's Majesty, Greenback, Dawn's Early Light, Rockets Red Glare, Yankee Doodle Dandelion, Mom's Apple Pie, Sea to Shining Sea, Orange You Glad You're in America, Land of the Free, Fruited Plains, and America the Blue-tiful.
What's In A Name? is a new blog that takes note of real names that are, well, unreal. "We like names. The stranger, the better. For our amusement and that of those who might happen upon this blog, we give you some of our current favorites."
If we could find an email address for any of the contributors to that blog, we'd send them one of our favorites, Gary I. Wakoff, Ph.D., J.D. or, as his students sometimes call him, Dr. G.I. Wakoff.
Dr. Wakoff received the Outstanding Teacher Award from the Spring, 1993 graduating class, so it's probably a name he bears with considerable pride--and a ginormous sense of humor.
Posted by
abnu on Tuesday, October 26, 2004 @ 4:46 PM
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Procter & Gamble (PG ) bought Old Spice from American Cyanamid in 1990 for $300 million. While it was largely an aftershave with a graying customer base, Old Spice had a small deodorant business. P&G bought the brand specifically to get that male deodorant so it could develop it with the advantage of an established brand name.
P&G already had the dominant female brand with Secret. But in the last 18 months, Old Spice has become the top male brand as well. In a recent interview, Esi Eggleston Bracey, P&G's general manager of deodorants and antiperspirants, discussed the business and repositioning of Old Spice with BusinessWeek Correspondent Robert Berner.
Strangely, the report of that discussion doesn't once mention that the repositioning of the Old Spice brand involved two new product names for the trusty old brand.
An article in Marketing Magazine last year, based on a Bain & Company study, tells the same story a bit differently.
Some mature brands grew through innovating product formulas, others through repositioning. Take, for example, Procter & Gamble's Old Spice, which is more than half-a-century old. P&G introduced High Endurance deodorant in 1994 and Red Zone in 1999, both sporty repositionings of Old Spice to attract younger male consumers. High Endurance and Red Zone counted for more than 75% of Old Spice deodorant sales in 2001 and helped the brand grow 13% a year in a category eking out 1% annual growth, on average.
Would a deodorant by any old name smell as fresh?
Posted by
abnu on Monday, October 25, 2004 @ 5:31 PM
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Britney Spears has joined forces with Elizabeth Arden to debut her first fragrance, Curious.
Does this mean that Spears, the gyrating songbird, is playing the grande dame like Arden's other celebrity endorsers (Elizabeth Taylor and Catherine Zeta-Jones)? With products called Deliciously Whipped! Body Soufflé and Lather Me Up! Shower Gel and the tag line "Do you dare?" it's doubtful that Spears is abandoning her saucy side just yet.
Idaho is losing the www and launching a redesigned website at a new address on the internet. It's a new idea that extends to the state government the US government's .gov, one of the top level domains, in place of www.state.id.us, Idaho's previous internet address.
The state’s official website has a new address and a new appearance -- idaho.gov -- providing a single, easily recognizable presence on the Internet for Idaho state government’s electronic delivery of online services and information for Idaho citizens.
"With the growing volume of information and services on our state portal, we needed a more easily recognized and remembered web address that is easy to navigate and organized around current topics and areas of interest they’re looking for," said Pam Ahrens, Director of the Department of Administration, and Chairman of the Information Technology Resource Management Council.
The dot.gov naming convention is becoming standard for government entities. Most importantly, web addresses containing "idaho.gov" will give a clear indication to users that these are official websites that belong to the State of Idaho, Ahrens added.
But the .gov TLD, or top level domain as it's called, is only for United States governmental entities, and is subject to the US federal government's dominion. Allowing the US states to use the .gov is a move in the right direction. Foreign governments that want to use a .gov domain on the "world wide web" must use the extension as a subdomain of their own country code, like the United Kingdom and Australia does. Other countries, like Canada, are unconventional, if not un-American, with regard to their official governmental domain. But, I digress.
Back to Idaho. "Wet, Wild and Wonderful" isn't some porn site on the www, but is one of the slogans suggested by the Brand Idaho project to sex up the state's image, which typically competes for tourism with the state slogan "Great Potatoes. Tasty Destinations." For business development, Idaho tries to escape its roots with slogans like "From Potato Chips to Micro Chips."
These imaging efforts often fail as decision-makers are unable to see their brand from the perspective of the consumers they are trying to reach. Rather, they look from the inside out, where the view is both comfortable and safe with reassurance from other insiders. Frequently, this inability to see yourself as others see you is due to a breakdown of process discipline, often led by firms who explain they understand brand strategy, then demonstrate they know only advertising.
Interesting.
Posted by
abnu on Wednesday, October 20, 2004 @ 8:24 AM
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The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has launched the WALRUS Program, which will study the feasibility of a new air vehicle capable of transporting 500-1,000 tons of military payload across 6,000 miles within 4 days. The US military identified deficiencies in its strategic airlift capability as far back as after the first Gulf War. Interest waned by the mid-1990's, but the recent conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq have again underscored the airlift need. Additionally, the need has been amplified by a key change in US military doctrine referred to as the "10-30-30" objective: to be able to deploy to a distant theater in 10 days, defeat an enemy within 30 days, and be ready for an additional fight within another 30 days. DARPA WALRUS envisions transporting an entire battle-ready Unit of Action from its operational US base to near enemy lines, termed "from fort to fight". The WALRUS air vehicle would dwarf every aircraft in existence today, with a total hull length anywhere from 600 to 1,000 feet. -- Aeros
I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together. See how they run like pigs from a gun, see how they fly. I’m crying. -- Lennon & McCartney, lyrics from I am the Walrus
Posted by
abnu on Sunday, October 17, 2004 @ 6:27 AM
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Mixing cinematic metaphors in an homage to Field of Dreams and Bullitt, Ford is bringing Steve McQueen back to life in an advertising campaign the company hopes will revive the aging Mustang brand.
For those too young to remember 1968, Mustang was at the height of its machismo in Bullitt, a classic movie that featured one of the most famous car chases ever filmed--a battle between two muscle cars down the hilly streets of San Francisco.
Coincidentally, the automotive nemesis of the Bullitt Mustang will also be hitting the streets of San Francisco again next year, in the form of a new Dodge Charger.
In medieval times, a charger was a horse trained and equipped to carry guys into battle. Although not particularly fleet, they were big and powerful—useful attributes for lugging guys wearing iron hats, steel suits, chain-mail shirts, and leather underwear.
Fast forward about 1000 years. It's the summer of 1965, and the descendants of the medieval chargers have become the Budweiser Clydesdales. Meanwhile, several guys are sitting around an office in Highland Park, Michigan, brainstorming names for a hotted-up version of the Dodge Coronet. The age of the pony car is already at full gallop, thanks to the mid-'64 arrival of the Ford Mustang, so something horsy seems apropos: Charger. Romantic war-horse imagery backed by serious brute force in the form of Mopar's storied Hemi V-8.
Although the word mustang is associated with wild horses, the name Mustang was actually suggested by Ford's executive stylist John Najjar because he was an aficionado of the P-51 Mustang fighter plane of World War II, according to Mustang racing history. But nobody seems to know how the fighter plane got the name.
Before he died in 1980, Steve McQueen tried unsuccessfully to buy the original Bullitt Mustang from a collector. I preferred the bad boy Hemi Charger then, and now too, but who the hell am I?
Posted by
abnu on Friday, October 15, 2004 @ 9:15 PM
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Is your name in harmony with your inner potential? Ask the Kabalarians.
Need a company name? The Kabalarian Philosophy can determine a name that spells success!
The destiny of your company is determined by the very letters and words that go to make up the name. By applying the understanding of the mathematical principle to design a mathematically balanced name, your business success can be increased dramatically!
We have to get back to the place we were, where the presidential debates are not the focus of our lives, but they're a nuisance. Okay, if you've played that flash animation three times and still want more, check out the latest political cartoon over at JibJab.
Posted by
abnu on Wednesday, October 13, 2004 @ 1:10 AM
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Whilst Language Log linguists debate the logic of naming transit loops clockwise or counterclockwise, rather than eastbound or westbound, motorists in Swindon intuitively circumnavigate the Magic Roundabout, which combines two roundabouts in one--the first the conventional, clockwise variety and the second, which revolves inside the first, sending traffic "anti-clockwise" as they say.
And magic it certainly is. Though it may confuse or amuse new visitors and baffle American tourists, the average Swindonian finds that his or her passage through one of the town's busiest junctions is actually quite fluid, even at peak times. Twenty-five years on, the Magic Roundabout still works, despite ever-increasing volumes of traffic.
As if by magic, British motorists traverse this seemingly complicated intersection without driving on either the right or the wrong side of the roadway.
Posted by
abnu on Monday, October 11, 2004 @ 10:54 PM
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Not every banner ad on Wordlab is a WINNER! But it made me smile, and click, when I spotted an advertisement for Your Furry Godmother. Visiting their website gave me a warm and fuzzy feeling all over.
Posted by
abnu on Friday, October 08, 2004 @ 3:25 PM
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A U.S. junior hockey league says it's the real North American Hockey League, and it wants a Quebec professional hockey league to stop using its nom de guerre, Ligue Nord-Americain de Hockey, which translates as...who knows? Anyone?
The (North) Americans say the name is confusing, and they don't like it even if it's in French. Well, maybe especially because it's in French. Stu Hackel, a spokeman for the NAHL, has his hackles up over this.
"It causes confusion," he said. "They play a very different style. We're a development league. We're not in the entertainment business, although our games are entertaining."
Forget the lawsuit; maybe the Canadians and the Americans should play for the title.
Posted by
abnu on Thursday, October 07, 2004 @ 7:17 PM
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Judy's the "office bike" in a creative viral marketing piece for Unilever's Pot Noodle. The award-winning campaign website, crafted by glue with cheeky Brit humour, has the look and feel of a typical porn site.
By mimicking the very nature of illicit consumption on the web, the web ring‚ we developed several interlinked sites each offering bite size bits of fun - easily consumed and highly compulsive! Each site has its own unique and unmistakable personality, but all share a common obsession with Pot Noodle. This gives us multiple reasons to talk to and engage our noodle users, thus growing involvement and customer knowledge over time.
The Noodle Web is a collection of homemade sites spoofing the ubiquitous, low budget sites common to web-communities, incorporating deliberately tacky design, dead links, DIY photo galleries and silly animations.
Well, it's not always possible to speak your mind on the Internet. So cyber-culture has developed a whole new way to curse and blaspheme without necessarily conjuring up the negativity associated with the whole phrases themselves. And beyond lessening the bite, it's much more efficient to communicate with acronyms everybody understands.
For example, there's the Pennsylvania Construction Codes Academy (PCCA) website, which reads like this:
Through the joint educational efforts of the Pennsylvania State Association of Township Supervisors (PSATS), the Pennsylvania State Association of Boroughs (PSAB) and the Pennsylvania League of Cities and Municipalities (PLCM), the Academy offers affordable and reliable building code training courses at convenient locations throughout the state.
And then there's this website, which we will refer to only as SSC.
Posted by
abnu on Monday, October 04, 2004 @ 11:00 PM
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A search engine with a difference, Vivisimo has re-launched with a new name to catch the attention of web surfers. Clusty refers to the clustering technology that Vivisimo has refined to sort search results into different categories related to the initial search request.
But, is Clusty the best name they could come up with? According to a forum poll posted on the internet by a Vivisimo employee, the short-listed names were: Vezmo, Clusty, Zimo, and Metaroo. Votes were cast, and Zimo was the apparent favorite, by a margin of 3-1. Clusty was chosen. The inside scoop on the thinking behind the name change was disclosed by Jason, who wrote:
Vivisimo has finally seen the weaknesses in its (ahem) web design and branding, and are now getting ready to launch a new search site. First order of business: we need a new name. Apparently, Vivisimo isn’t the easiest name for a native English speaker to remember, say or type.
If you cross the information superhighway to get to J-Walk Blog, you'll find John Walkenbach playing in heavy traffic, blogging about "stuff that may or may not interest you." I think you'll find this "stuff" is much more interesting than the usual internet roadkill.
Posted by
abnu on Friday, October 01, 2004 @ 2:02 PM
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Note the cool Fine Print: The content found on WordLab
is free to the world. Although we cannot guarantee that any of this
content is not already in use by someone, somewhere, on this planet
who may have seen it on this Web site or created it independently of
our Web site, we have made a reasonable effort to give you what we believe
to be original names and slogans and generally good stuff. Use what
you will of our content since it is here for the taking. However, if
you decide to use one of our names for a commercial activity, and since
we have no assurance that the name may not already be in use by someone
else as a trademark, domain name or otherwise, we strongly suggest that
you take appropriate legal precautions, such as seeing a lawyer. In
short, any necessary due diligence is up to you, but we at least make
no claims on your potential future dream name. We merely ask that if
you do decide to use any of our content, that you please send us an
email ["word at wordlab dot com"] about it for use in our
internal records and eplosive marketing campaigns. Thank you, and enjoy.
The owner of Pufferbelly Toys in St. Helens worries when Homeland Security agents show up on official business. Nothing about running a small store called Pufferbelly Toys prepared Stephanie Cox for a cryptic phone call from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. 
