The Short List

 

Not that we won’t accept others, but a meeting was held and a short list drawn up. If everyone could nominate their favourites (and add new ones if you insist, oe provide variations on these themes) that’d be awesome. Yes, I’m aware that there’s probably only five people likely to respond. We’re having a poll anyhow. In no particular order (and with a brand new entry which I just thought of):

  1. Opinion Pirates
    opinionpirates.com
  2. Mild Themes
    mildthemes.com
  3. Rightly Wrong
    rightlywrong.com
  4. Certain Doom
    certaindoom.net
  5. Since You’ll All Die Anyway
    sinceyoullalldieanyway.com
  6. Idle Discourse
    idle-discourse.com
  7. Born Mad
    bornmad.com
  8. Entirely Possible
    entirelypossible.com
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33 Responses to “The Short List”

  1. Entirelypossible would be my pick of those. And, btw, a quick google seems to suggest there is a lack of unanimity about whether grapefruits is an acceptable plural. Either way I am all in favour of a rebranding — just think how well the Bush administration’s attempt to rebrand the war on terrorism as the struggle against violent extremism went a few months back.

  2. I like opinionpirates because it’s my suggestion. entirelypossible is better than rightlywrong and my second choice.

  3. I was hoping you’d weigh in at some point, Andrew.

    Even if it were a correct plural, grapefruits isn’t as snappy as grapefruit and I never wanted the site to be called the latter. Hence there’s at the very least a discrepancy issue between the url and the name.

    The newcomer hits an early lead!

  4. Andy just snuck in there. Make me a liar, will you, Andy? I’ll use my vote for Entirely Possible but my second preference is Since You’ll All Die Anyway.

    I don’t like pirates. I considered suggesting mediapirates but that’s a bit too close to the truth.

    I think six of the suggestions are mine, maybe five. 5 is Jackson’s, and I’m not sure who first suggested 2. I’m either very good at making up website names or good at shouting down other people’s ideas.

  5. whatwouldyou.com This idea is all mine.

  6. sinceyoualldieanyway.com!

    Ooo…or bornmad because it is very true. :P

  7. haha. In my haste to steal credit for Tom’s ramblings I mistyped. whatwouldyouknow.com

  8. certaindoom or entirelypossible are my choices.

  9. To sum up the votes so far:

    1. entirelypossible.com — 4 votes
    2. sinceyoullalldieanyway.com — 2 votes
    3. certaindoom.com — 1 vote
    4. opinionpirates.com — 1 vote

    I think we’re still waiting on a few votes. Or the perfect, perfect website name that has yet to be thought of. I’ve heard rumblings of support for idle-discourse.com but it has yet to be voted for. It’s a bit dry, but using the word ‘idle’ seems appropriate. A synonym for entirelypossible.com is relativelyplausible.com. I don’t mind telling you, I’m sick of this crap.

  10. tracesofnuts.net?

    mightbewrong.org?

    thevoicestellme.com?

    containsmildthemes.com?

    mythtaken.com?

    Ugh.

  11. tracesofnuts sounds alright

    miscellany.net?

  12. I like tracesofnuts too although would probably still prefer entirelypossible.

    mixedopinions.org/net?

  13. Miscellany is a cool site name Ben, but it seems some bastards have taken it. What they haven’t taken (because it’s not a word) is miscellanica.com. What do we think of that?

    Tracesofnuts scores high on the silliness axis but less well on the relevance axis. Entirelypossible manages a medium level of relevance on all the axes, and is still one of my favourites too.

    Is no one impressed by mythtaken.com? Let me plead its case. Relevance: we are often mistaken, and often about myths and stories. Snappiness: it’s one word. Humour: it’s a glorious pun (taken from Buffy, but it’s obscure enough for no one to notice).

    Jackson mentioned to me that he votes for sinceyoullalldieanyway and opinionpirates. So the former is now quite close to entirelypossible with three votes.

  14. I voteidle-discourse.com or entirelypossible.com

  15. mythtaken scores well on all your objective measures but just sounds a bit lame to me. Maybe it is something to do with puns based on lisps

    I could be convinced on sinceyoullalldieanyway, although it seems a little pessimistic and a little long. Could we lose the first or last word?

    And a couple more:

    (to)leadingorder or tofirstorder.otherthingsbeingequal

  16. Best of a bunch of bad choices ;)

  17. There is a danger going with puns in that even I’ll eventually think it’s lame. It’s probably best avoided.

    The idea behind sinceyoullalldieanyway is this: “Well, since you’re all going to die anyway, I may as well tell you my evil plan.” We already cut out the “going to” but it’s still perhaps not obvious that it’s not supposed to be morbid. Losing the first or last word would lose any trace of this villainspeak altogether.

    You maths nerd! :) I thought the expression was “allthingsbeingequal”?

  18. The idea behind sincey’all.. completely passed me by. Makes a lot more sense now.

    Both are expressions. Your version does have the advantage of increased brevity.

    Yes, I am sorry, I realise this website, whatever it might be called, is a nerd free zone…

    And my final suggestion (maybe): fullnessoftime.com as in ‘the website will be updated in the…’.

  19. Fullness of time is kind of cool. Is it time to make a short, short list?

    Maths nerdiness scores poorly on the relevance axis when compared to tv or music nerdiness. That’s all I meant to say. I’m not leading a pogrom against maths nerds!

    Therein lies the problem with sinceyouall… It’s not immediately obvious what the hell it’s actually about and (more importantly) if you don’t get it, it seems a bit morbid and gothish. Plus, it’s not even the name of the site yet, and already we can’t be arsed typing it properly.

  20. You could get a short name and link it sinceyoull so we would only have to type a short address.

    Ileaveittothereadersasanexercise.com

  21. There’s been some concern that I couldn’t be bothered weighting first and second preferences. Please attend carefully for a recount. Er, but not now.

  22. if we’re going on the obscure references ticket, how about braxiatel.net/org/com?

  23. I hate explaining the braxiatel thing to people as it is! :) There’s nerdy and then there’s nerdy…

  24. jacksonisawesome.com?

  25. You mean you haven’t registered it already? I guess you must have decided to work backwards through the dictionary in your bid to register all jacksonis(insert positive adjective here).com domains.

  26. Jackson is a wesome?

  27. i vote opinionpirates. or areyoupondering.blah cos that hasnt been voted for and i want to extend the short list.

  28. Andy and I were considering idle-minds.org the other day.

  29. On the subject of escapism:

    • mindlessescapism.com
    • reverica.com (or some other play on reverie)
    • idlereverie.com
    • timewasting.org

    James suggested the other day kakistocracy.com — a kakistocracy is a government where the least qualified people rule. But, rather shockingly for a word that’s not even in my dictionary, .com, .org and .net are taken.

  30. And so I struggle on, in the hope that one name will unite all the disparate grapefruitian tribes behind me and allow me to march on to greener pastures. Er:

    • sittingcomfortably.net (.com is taken by an office supplies company in Glasgow)
    • takemetoyourleader.org
    • punyhumans.net/.org (.com is taken by someone who looks like he once did have an actual proper website there — punyhuman.com on the other hand is taken by a band)
    • earthlingscum.com
  31. That last option has the unfortunate property that you can put the space at the wrong point and we sound like an interplanetary porn site.

  32. Do we want to get into alien porn? Could be a new market, plenty of moola to be made but I’m not keen on tentacles.

    idlereverie.com is good.
    idledreaming.com?

  33. The moment I saw “That last option has the unfortunate…” on the front page my brain went there. So, it turns out, scum isn’t a very good name to put in a url, especially following a noun. Or even a verb.