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

Holo-comp? Keyboard? Photonic Computer? Holo-Tablet?

Along similar lines, perhaps "Holopad" or "Holotab"? Or maybe "Lightpad"/"Light-tab"?

Alternatively, what about "Holopanel"?

Or maybe "Light-touch"?

How about "The Postcard"?

You hold it, it's the size of one, and you post on it.

I'll go with "holopad."

Would you say that "horde", when considered through the lens of its Turco-Mongolian root being described as "the regional equivalent of a clan or a tribe", is suitable as a term for a social group formed from an aggregation of multiple tribes, comparable to how a single tribe is often formed from the aggregation of multiple clans that at least perceive themselves to be kin-related?

I think so.

Just be aware that it's likely, I'd guess, that many readers will nevertheless see it as indicating a large, destructive group.

Edited by ArsThaumaturgis on Apr 1st 2024 at 10:27:17 AM

Yeah, I'm aware. Honestly, I did try to find an alternative, but couldn't find anything that wasn't evocative of modern human "post-wild ape" sociality and civilization.

Would a "throng" work as an alternative to "horde" instead by any chance?

I suspect that that's because humans apply a lot of those words to various human groups.

I mean, even "band" has been used—see "Band of Brothers"—and "clan", to my mind, most strongly brings to mind the Scottish.

There are a few that are primarily applied to animals, of course—but those tend to have specific connotations. Words like "flock" or "swarm" or "herd".

Not really. It just sounds like a small and disorderly group.

For the record, this is for a species of "ape-humans" I'm designing that I've brought up in the past:

• Gist of the concept
• Backstory
• Elaboration on their intelligence
• And by "ape-humans", I mean "they look like humans if their anatomy was geared for hand-walking and tree-swinging, had prehensile feet, and behaved like a significantly less humanlike version of Tarzan", to put it in simple terms.
• Model for social organization

In the context of the social model, "throng" at best would be an alternative for "troop".

I was actually looking at human social group names, because I had already exhausted the available animal group names and found nothing that suits my needs. I suspect that primatologists may have deliberately based such terms that they use on words for humans, since humans are primates to begin with.

And "band" and "clan" are actually used in primatological terminology in pretty much the same way that I'm using them in my model; that's why I picked them in the first place. The fact that the first term appears to be derived from "band society", which is considered larger than a clan but smaller than a tribe, is just icing on the cake.

Yeah, "herd" does have some use in primatology for what I'm calling a "tribe" in my model; I don't like it, because 1) it evokes the image of stereotypically placid herbivores like cows, sheep and elephants, which clashes with my intention for the species to be not only predatory omnivores, but also quite prone to non-predatory, sometimes deadly violence against both other species and conspecifics. Also, it can get confusing if I want to use the verb "herd" or phrases like "herd mentality" in reference to certain behaviors; there would be an implication of a connection between "herd" as a group name and those words/phrases, when such a connection doesn't exist.

That is an interesting possibility, indeed.

This is fair.

This is the sort of thing that I was getting at when I said "but those tend to have specific connotations"—that is, those weren't suggestions, but rather examples of words that I wasn't suggesting, despite their being words for large numbers of animals.

Ah, I see! I misread you then—sorry about that!

In that case, and given your description of these primates being at times violent, perhaps "horde" is in fact a good option.

Regarding "throng", by the way, I'll note that it usually applies to large groups, not small ones, I believe.

"Disorderly"—or more accurately, "disordered"—is a likely connotation, however, indeed.

Yeah, I was just explaining what my problem is with that word for everyone else who may be reading this convo.

That, and the fact that it's used as a name for the very large social groups of mandrills. Which look fucking cool with that blue facial skin, might I add.

Yeah, in hindsight, I vaguely recall that the contexts I've occasionally seen it used in align with that.

Edited by MarqFJA on Apr 1st 2024 at 5:03:06 PM

Fair enough on all counts, then! ^_^

And indeed, the point regarding the mandrills does add weight to going with "horde".

If i named a side character Gaston, would everybody just automatically think of the Disney villain? What do you think?

Yes, but that didn't stop the guys behind SMT 4 and Unicorn Overlord (who both have characters named Gaston). So I'd say it shouldn't matter even if you are paranoid about lawsuits. (In that case I highly doubt the courts would throw the suit out)

Edited by MorningStar1337 on Apr 8th 2024 at 7:47:37 AM

I'm not worried about lawsuits on a random character's first name

Gaston is a real name therefor more than just one person in the world is named that already.

So there is nothing wrong with using it, since not all people in the world even know who Gaston in "Beauty and the Beast" even is.

Sorry, one arrow too many.

Edited by Trainbarrel on Apr 8th 2024 at 6:07:16 PM

that's my point TBC.

Exactly. I never thought that. It's about association (none of the readers have propably heard about any other Gaston).

Edited by Nukeli on Apr 11th 2024 at 6:02:29 PM

Re: Gaston

I very vaguely remember an old children's or young adult book where there was a French exchange student named Gaston (or a similar French name starting with G?). In that case, the name was obviously picked to remind the reader that this character is French, in case you forgot who is the foreign guy. There's probably a trope for that.

I know about the Disney character because of Pop-Cultural Osmosis, that is, people on the internet like to reference the franchise. But at least to me, there is no One Gaston Limit that means that now every other Gaston can only exist as a reference to or in the shadow of the Disney Gaston. But I haven't watched any of the Beauty and the Beast movies, so there's that.

Now I wonder how I would feel if a fictional work just randomly had a character name similar to a Disney property where I don't have to look up the TV Tropes character page to learn who that character actually is. Like, say, Arielle.

Title ideas for a The Transformers (Marvel) fanfic?

It's a political/action thing that takes place during the last years before the beginning of the Autobot-Decepticon war. It's about a city-state's basically-president and his gladiator bodyguard as the planet drifts towards the war.

(Some setting explanation[1][2][3][4][5][6])

I had one idea of my own, but i don't think "A Storm Brews" is any good.

"The Four Pistons Policy"?

(Four = The four horsemen of the apocalypse)

(Pistons = Autobots and decepticons)

(Policy = The political aspect.)

Edited by Trainbarrel on Apr 11th 2024 at 5:38:56 PM

Oh, there are also the Gaston Lagaffe comics. So there is more than one famous Gaston already.

(Coincidentally, the TV Tropes ad server decided that I am apparently the target audience for the comic books after I posted here.)

Let me note that Shakespeare's The Tempest has a character named Ariel.

(A male character, interestingly. The gender-association of names can vary across time and culture!)

(Iirc "Ariel" was a male name until the Disney movie, which was the reason people started giving it to girls)