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November 26, 2007

Kindle Kinda Not Good Brand Naming

AmazonLogo1.gifWe have known that Kindle, Amazon's eBook reader, was coming for some time now, but last week we saw Newsweek's Steve Levy raving about it as the "iPod of reading."

There are two interesting naming developments here:

  • For one, Kindle is not naming a gizmo or a device as is often the case with cell phones, but it's naming a service that will act as an extension of the Amazon store.
  • The Kindle name is a verb, not a noun. Where have all the good nouns gone? In almost any category they are taken.

Amazon-Kindle.gifI also have to wonder if the name Kindle was well chosen as ParisLemon has a picture of kindling burning on its blog and there are sure to be many "up in smoke" jokes cracked if this particular gadget, I mean service, gets burned in the marketplace.

This seems possible after Scoble's review and other iffy reviews from the book set.

I also think that the Amazon brand name appeals to people who love books, and eBook readers are meant to help, not hurt, those people.

A product name like Kindle might be meant to refer to "kindling excitement" but it also reminds me of book burning. Also, as Laura Freberg points out, "I surely don't want my "book" to ignite in my lap" like some computer gizmos have in the past.

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Posted by William Lozito at November 26, 2007 8:23 AM
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