The "What's a good name for this?" thread

I'd be careful using religious words for something that's supposed to sound benign. If it's only supposed to sound benign from the companies' point of view, then I guess that works, but only if the marketing departments are in the dark. Referring to yourself by a religious term can easily be a slap in the face of someone who follows a different religion, and slaps in faces are generally not good for subterfuge.

,

I wouldn't call it a "slap to the face", but I agree it can be alienating, and would like to add that it may also alienate those from the target religion, by being blasphemous from some points of view.

Not only that, but I think those companies would like to downplay the fact they are the de facto supreme rulers of the organization, to not look more inclusive and less intimidating.

edited 28th Apr '16 3:38:43 PM by EternaMemoria

I chose the religious name because the source work for the fanfic that this megacorp alliance features in has a lot of religious Theme Naming going on.

And the companies would actually present this consortium as officially serving the purpose of "managing competition between member companies so as to avoid accidentally causing undue economic damage on both the local and the global levels" and "coordinating efforts by member companies to encourage the growth and sustainability of the world economy and spreading the spirit of cooperative competition in corporate cultures, for the benefit of all".

edited 29th Apr '16 4:23:26 AM by MarqFJA

It's not about whether it's really a slap in the face. It's about whether people will perceive it as such. That's what marketing is interested in. But if there's a theme, then my argument is invalid.

It could be easily justified by the founders being fond of Christian themes, or even some/all of them being actual Christians. Besides, the logo of the consortium is basically five stylized scrolls/books (representing the five member companies), making it a Meaningful Name in a way.

edited 29th Apr '16 7:01:21 AM by MarqFJA

One thing that I forgot about my megacorp name question: I was more concerned about whether the part after "Consortium" is sufficiently descriptive of the official purpose of the consortium as I had described.

Also, new question: I'm writing down the first points of what I consider a "universal set of laws" for all of my fanfics, which would tackle important issues that pertain to my fanfic writings at the most general level, such as how to reconcile my personal religious beliefs with story ideas that are completely and unavoidably incompatible with said beliefs ^note Summary of my solution: The Abrahamic God as I believe Him to be exists and is in completely different league from all of the other cosmic entities, including all of the various depictions of that self-same Abrahamic God (which are completely unrelated to Him, and are utterly insignificant to him in spite of however transcendent they may be to other divine and/or mortal beings). He is however seemingly disinterested in the affairs of the lesser cosmic entites, for reasons that are His alone to know.. I'm stuck on what name to use for this document, though.

How about the Omnilex?

Edit: If you're not going to use it, then I am.

edited 2nd May '16 11:58:12 AM by pablo360

... What the hell does "omnilex" even mean? I thought of using "manifesto", but the dictionary definitions I found seem to rule it out.

"Omni" is all and "lex" is law.

I know what its individual components literally mean. I was asking about what the word as a whole means, especially with respect to my question.

Bear in mind that I only meant "law" in a loose sense.

Um... it's a neologism. It literally means whatever you want it to mean.

... And I now feel stupid for somehow forgetting that what I'm looking for can be adequately described by the words "tenet", "doctrine" and, to a lesser extent, "dogma" and "creed". You may now proceed to Dope Slap me for wasting your time.

edited 3rd May '16 8:14:49 AM by MarqFJA

Compendium of Dogmatic Axiomata.

... "Axiom" is an even better word, since it highlights that they're mainly assumptions on my part that can never actually be proven or disproven.

Does Compendium for Axioms of Omniversal Cosmology in Marq's Fictional Writings sound about right?

edited 3rd May '16 8:27:05 AM by MarqFJA

Compendium Axiomata in Omniversalis Cosmologia. Because Latin. (Might need grammar correction due to Google Translate) And for an added bonus, it can be an ancient manuscript or something In-Universe.

edited 3rd May '16 8:39:08 AM by WillDeRegio

... It's an out-of-universe description of in-universe facts about the aggregate of settings for my fictional writings, that are universal to all (or at least most) of those settings.

edited 3rd May '16 8:53:02 AM by MarqFJA

...does it even need a name? I mean, if it's for your own fanfics, would it ever even be published?

I need a name for a Fantasy Counterpart Culture of Japan. I want to preferably NOT use alternative names for Japan.

My previous name for it translates into gibberish(thank you Google Translate and forgotten etymology!), though I'm still going to use the original name as the botched name the western charcters use In-Universe due to a translation error several centuries prior that nobody decided to fix. As a result, the current name might trigger a few Berserk Buttons in the natives.

I would publish it on a personal site (and link it whenever feasible and relevant) in order to make sure that those prospective readers who would bother looking for answers from the guy writing the stories they're reading would get answers on those important questions, especially since I would not be surprised if they would get curious about how, for example, I, as a practicing Sunni Muslim, could countenance writing a story where God is an utterly villainous entity, or stories where God (evil or not) coexists with (almost) every other deity that real-life humanity has conceived.

... And you know what? I'm just gonna go with Axioms of Omniversal Cosmology in Marq's Fictional Writings. Not every compendium includes the word "compendium" or similar words in its name.

edited 3rd May '16 3:32:54 PM by MarqFJA

Ah.

Are you looking for an endonym or a culturally-acceptible exonym? Japan's self-chosen name (its "endonym"), Nippon, can be translated as Land of the Rising Sun, because Japan is to the east of the Asian mainland, specifically China (and the Korean penninsula). Therefore, a cultural counterpart might choose an endonym that similarly reflects something geographically significant.

Japan is an exonym derived from a Chinese phrase with a similar meaning that got morphed after being transliterated from Chinese to Portuguese and from that to English. China's original exonym for Japan was a bit more rude.

...okay, technically none of that is a name, but it should help you find one. The key thing with deriving names is that the details of who's coming up with the names are more important than you think.

edited 4th May '16 11:13:07 AM by pablo360

If you go the "Land of the Rising Sun" route, how about Asahi ("rising sun") or Hinode ("sunrise")? Japan also used to be called Wa or Wakoku back in ye olde days, though I wouldn't use that, seeing how it means "docile".

edited 4th May '16 7:53:51 AM by MorningStar1337

I think those are exactly the "other names for Japan" Will De Regio was talking about not using. Also, Wa was the "rude" exonym I mentioned in my post.

Remember, with counterpart cultures, you want the culture to be parallel to a real-world culture, not derived from it.

Unfortunately, this means that in order to make the name not be arbitrary, you need to put a lot of work into conlang linguistics and etymology.

edited 4th May '16 11:13:16 AM by pablo360

After doing thinking/research/Google Translating, I'm leaning towards Dai Chishima(alt. Senshima) Teikoku/Kunshu-sei^note Great Thousand Island(s) Empire/Monarchy, or Chishima/Senshima for short, at this point. Now, how can I improve on this(grammar, better wording, etc.)?

edited 5th May '16 7:06:20 AM by WillDeRegio

From what I've been learning, the Japanese use specific suffixes to numbers depending what is being counted. Suffix for island is "-tou" ("とう"), plus there needs to be a particle between "islands" and "monarchy/kingdom" so I think it'd be "Sentou Shima-no Teikoku/Kunshu-sei. Also, wouldn't "Subarashii" be better than "Dai"? It means "great, wonderful", while "dai" is, as far as I understand, a modifier used to denote numbering - "dai-ichi" being "first", for example. So, I'd go with Subarashii Sentou Shima-no Teikoku or Subarashii Sentou Shima-no Kunshu-sei, with Sentoushima as the "common name".

edited 5th May '16 8:12:18 AM by Kakai