I’ll Give You $50 for a Worse Brand Name Than Knol

Filed under Critique / Analysis

Knol is Google's newest assault on the rest of the internet. (They're convinced they own it.) I'm sure it will do well, because it's a Google property, but...

K-N-O-L is their brand name? I couldn't think of a worse name if I tried. In fact, I'll offer a cash prize for a worse name. (Details at the end of this article.) First, let's explore this:

  • Knol contains a silent letter.
  • Phonetically, It starts and ends with a soft consonant. (This guarantees the following conversation will be had countless times... "Blah blah blah Knol." "What?")
  • It's a play on the word knowledge, masquerading as the root. (Which is actually "know".) But they drop the "w" and add the "l" leaving us with "knol."
  • They don't even own Knol.com. Knol is at knol.google.com. Knol.com, on the other hand, sells steam cleaners in Sweden. No kidding. This is who Google couldn't afford to buy out.

Google is liquid to the tune of $10 billion dollars. Couldn't they buy knol.com? Or even something nice like know.com, or known.com? And what's with the web 2.0 drop-a-letter-add-a-letter bandwagon? This is going to look passé in 6 months. It kinda looks that way right now.

Apple Inc. just bought Me.com. Now that's a domain. That's a brand name. Sure the launch sucked, but no one will care in 6 months. They will, however, still be having this conversation:

"...Knol."

"What?"

"No. KNOL."

"What!?"

"KNOLLLL."

"Nal?"

"Eh, screw it."

Google was a game changer 6 years ago, but that is an eternity in web-years. They're looking more and more like Microsoft or General Motors when it comes to fresh innovation and execution. It's like they're trying to confuse.

In fact, if anyone can come up with a worse brand name than Knol, post it in the comments. Next week I'll pick out the worst one and Paypal you $50.

The Rules:

  • Has to be SFW.
  • 2 syllable maximum.
  • Has to be pronounceable.
  • I'll announce the winner here next week. (I'll also send them an email.)
  • If you're related to me or someone who works at Voltage, you can't win.
  • The winner is my pick, which means no whining if/when you lose.
  • One entry per email address.
  • Cuil doesn't count.

Update: We Have a Winner

By Wade on 07/31/08  
101 Responses
  1. mildweed 07/31/08

    Cuil should count.
    Awful name.

  2. Wade 07/31/08

    I'm just trying to block the obvious choice.

  3. akehurst 07/31/08

    How about....

    nuTsie

    yes, the T is capitalized. Anagram of iTunes.
    http://www.nutsie.com

    Named after a photoshopped picture of a squirrel with an enormous ballsack, no joke. Just look at the favicon.

  4. MartinSeebach 07/31/08

    Knol.com is Dutch. The links at the bottom is a tribute to various sites that apparently got the link wrong and linked to knol.com.

    I'm not a dutch-speaker, but the copy goes something like, "Knol steam cleaning systems would like to thank the following sites, amoung others: ..... The favour is completely overwhelming".

  5. dmfdmf 07/31/08

    Geek Squad.... I don't really have to lobby and put up a witty comment for this to win do I?

  6. dak 07/31/08

    Aids. Google Aids. As in "knowledge aids" or "learning aids", of course.

  7. mattley 07/31/08

    Since it is Google, I'm surprised they didn't use

    "Gnol"

    which would be worse. A little.

  8. Pierre Far 07/31/08

    Google Null.

    Pierre

  9. woz 07/31/08

    http://grobli.com (pronounced grow-blee)

    "The new millenium's repository for all knol-edge." ;)

    My hard work is shown below.

    1) Pick random language: German.

    2) Translating "great library" from English to German yields "große Bibliothek".

    Now, let's mix it up a bit to give it that Web 2.0 flair.

    3) Use "grob" for great (ß looks like a "b", doesn't it?) and "li" for library.

    Bonus) Using namecheap, it looks like grobli.com is available! :)

  10. Neil 07/31/08

    I assume the limit of two syllables is to exclude the otherwise obvious winner: MobileMe.

  11. Kevin Arthur 07/31/08

    doostang.com

    I agree that knol is hard to top.

  12. cdfmrl 07/31/08

    "Libe"

    Short for Library. Somehow.

  13. pacdude 07/31/08

    I respectfully submit "Ghoti™" (prounounced: fish).

    I think that Ghoti™ symbolizes a re-contextualized stable approach that is offbeat enough to be Web 2.0, easy enough to say, and easy enough to write. It also smells like lemon, can make your bed, and will sing Stevie Nicks songs at the drop of a hat.

  14. bullseye 07/31/08

    If you were to start a PayPal-like company, what's the first domain name that comes to mind? Were you thinking Flooz.com too?

    Nothing spells success like a name that could be confused with "a usually young woman of loose morals (Webster)" or the plural of a virus. Not even $35mil could help that one.

  15. pixelgeek 07/31/08

    I can't believe that no-one has submitted Wang.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Laboratories

  16. The1philipo 07/31/08

    Are you looking for an existing name, or an original one we just make up?

  17. ericksonstudio 07/31/08

    Knul. As in "null."

  18. rosskarchner 07/31/08

    Brainema?

  19. jdriscoll 07/31/08

    "GNU".

  20. shaun 07/31/08

    It has to be 'AdeZ' for me. If mango flavoured soya milk wasn't a bad enough prospect then having a name that everyone pronounces 'Aids' instead of the two syllable 'A-des' as it's apparently supposed to be pronounced is the killer blow.

    At least they own the domain name http://www.adez.com

  21. shaun 07/31/08

    Oh, and I forgot that AdeZ is a Unilever brand.

  22. benatkin 07/31/08

    Knolecules, since Knol is a play on the word mol, which is a unit of molecular measurement.

    I took another look at Knol. What a mess. A "verified" article said that Ada Lovelace was the daughter of Charles Babbage (she's the daughter of Lord Byron). It's been fixed now. Someone posted the correction in the comments. Another person replied to the correction saying "Sorry, the librarian in me wants to point you to a more authoritative source" because the person posting the correction referenced Wikipedia.

    I find that ironic. Google Knol tries to be authoritative, yet Wikipedia turns out to be right. So what does a commenter do? Insist on using an authoritative site.

    This is not a community that I want to be a part of, and I agree that the name sucks.

    http://knol.google.com/k/jennifer-taylor/the-decline-of-women-in-computer/u67r-Ndua/5hwjo0#

  23. zof 07/31/08

    GNU is bad indeed :D

    "Zott", it's a german milk related product brand: http://www.zott.de/

    Bad sound! and more, they aired some TV ads in my country (Belgium) with a small kid singing a bad rap (you know like the bad-rap-ad in wayne's world). You also have to know that "zot" means "dipwad" in local dialect from Brussels.

    I must say that the exclamation mark at the end of Yahoo! has always bothered me.

    "Flickr" is unpronounceable in French.

    "Yast" from Suse is awfull....

  24. cchoge 07/31/08

    Erud.

    From the root erudition. Since the Google idea is that people write articles about stuff they know, and attach their name to the article. The writers are experts in a field, and can show off that expertise. Erudition implies bookish knowledge that is above an average person's comprehension, so right away the name can give people some unease while at the same time stroke their egos. Are they really smart enough to be reading, let alone writing for this thing? But if you do write for it, doesn't that make you somehow better than other people?

    Now this name doesn't have the soft ending like Knol, but it does have the advantage of sounding too hard; too short. Erud; sounds like rude.

  25. leodavinci 07/31/08

    Since there is no note as to whether has to be an actual brand name, I made up one.

    Based on the idea that knowledge + cool (kn + ol) = knol, here is my submission;
    knowledge + fun (kn + un) = knun

  26. chrishawn 07/31/08

    I don't know the company I work for has to be up there.

    Knouen (no-en)

    has the silent K as well, but has the added benefit that you can't tell anyone it over the phone without spelling it 2x, and when people ask who i work for and i tell them, they think i say no one.

  27. dressedinvalue 07/31/08

    I want to lern more about bizness.

  28. jeff 07/31/08

    they could have called it "Google Noesis"

    ...maybe that's not worse.

  29. shadytrees 07/31/08

    My submission: Ayn Rand.

  30. Drew Thaler 07/31/08

    Whol. (As in: something that contains the whol of our knol-edge. Ahem.)

    * Silent letter. Could be either W or H, depending!
    * Starts and ends with weak sounds.
    * Unclear pronunciation. Hole? Hahl? Hall? Wole? Wahl? Wall?
    * Potential homonym for "hole", which yields TONS of awful-sounding spoken constructions. "You got that from a (hole)?" "I've got a (hole)." "Hey, look at this (hole)!" "Stick that in your (hole)".
    * One letter away from Whor.

  31. ZinkDifferent 07/31/08

    You can't think of something worse?

    Quorn

    http://www.quorn.com

    Bon apétit! Small unmarked bills, please...

  32. dwiskus 07/31/08

    Gigli.

  33. kehlehfeh 07/31/08

    http://www.bullpoo.com
    They've recently changed it to Duedee.com.

    It's kind of crap.

  34. glen 07/31/08

    Most VoIP companies:

    Skype
    Joost
    iSkoot
    Phweet

    All real and all sound like STDs.

  35. khillabolt 07/31/08

    Knofu - as in Knowledge-Fu

    All of the words on the site, have their character shifted one position to the right in the alphabet.

    Yeah, and you could earn colored belts for your knowledge - Heh, look at me, I have a parchment belt.

    Well, I'm a third-degree ancient scrolls belt. :)

  36. johntmeche3 07/31/08

    How about..

    Labi (pronounced Laybee)

    A total mutant form of library labratory that ends up just sounding like...well...gotta be SFW

  37. lukesh 07/31/08

    "Knowr"

    A forgettable derivative of the word "knowledge", hurts your mouth to say, a shameless implementation of Domain Naming 2.0 (tm), the domain is parked, etc, etc.; a categorically worse brand than "Knol".

    I win.

  38. dandelany 07/31/08

    I work at a company called "Norvax," which I always thought was a TERRIBLE brand name. It sounds like an antidepressant (which is ironic, since working there tends to have the opposite effect on me).

  39. Richard Fairhurst 07/31/08

    Joomla!. No question.

    Their slightly fattened logotype just compounds the offence.

    And in followup to #26, can I nominate .biz as the worst TLD? It's just so... cheesy.

  40. ericksonstudio 07/31/08

    whizzdumm

  41. jg 07/31/08

    ENTREMANEUR - Charting New Courses, Inc.

    PORNLYWEDS - Evans Entertainment Corporation

    EATAINMENT - Nutratainment, LLC

    WEBUME - Thomas J. Jalbert, Individual

    INNOVISIONEERING - Econolite Group, Inc.

  42. joewhite 07/31/08

    Fluke

  43. ineffable27 07/31/08

    I knew a guy who chose the domain

    sieved.com

    because he couldn't afford to get his original idea for the domain: sorted.com.

    This domain is hard to remember because:

    - who knows how to spell that word, from hearing it?? Is it -ie or -ei ??

    - the meaning is not obvious, unlike sorted. To say the least.

    Just bad.

    Unsurprisingly, the (ambitious) site did not last long.

  44. ineffable27 07/31/08

    Also, "sieved" does not exactly roll off the tongue... like 'Rural Juror'! Ha.

  45. markmd 07/31/08

    nuur.com

    How about “Newer”. Maybe “Nuir” or “Nure”. Nope. I've got it. The name for our salon should be Nuur!

    Bonus points for involuntarily sounding like a retarded person when you say it! : )

  46. SSteve 07/31/08

    Are you sure the "k" is silent? It's not if you're Norwegian.

    My favorite bad brand name is from a company that put out a quarterly magazine to push their swimming pool chemicals. It was a contraction of the words "pool" and "life" with the extra "l" brilliantly removed:

    Poolife

    It was like this for years, but I saw recently that the wayward "l" had made a return.

    As far as making one up, how about "eerp"? e-Enterprise Resource Planning. Sounds like throwing up in one's mouth or that cowboy buried in Colma.

  47. flwombat 07/31/08

    This violates at least two of the rules, but how can we not mention analtech.com? That's short for "analysis", for the uninitiated, and yes it is quite real.

    I nominate MonCom as the brand for a monetization strategy consulting firm. Park it at moncom.com. Soft consonants abound, impossible to understand over the phone, will confuse anyone close to the military (sounds like "noncom").

    None of these are as bad as Knol.

  48. The1philipo 07/31/08

    Wikin - A combination of We, Wiki, and Keen (pronounced we-keen)

    Multiple meanings galore and hard to say without sounding like you said 'we king', 'weakling', or 'weaken'; depending on your regional dialect.

  49. flwombat 07/31/08

    Hindsight! i should have just said Mon ("visit us at mon.com"). Has all of the benefits of MonCom, above, plus it can be confused easily with HON (the office furniture company), is offensive to Jamaicans, and can lead to hilarious misunderstandings at the airport (it sounds like "bomb"!)

  50. dlewis 07/31/08

    Laszlo.

    Used to work there. Tried for 4 years to change it. We didn't even own Laszlo.com so we had to use Laszlosystems.com. At least once you learn how to spell Knol you wouldn't ask again....

  51. saddino 07/31/08

    Porkolt - http://www.porkolt.com

  52. complex 07/31/08

    PENSIEVE.

  53. kingkao 07/31/08

    JURNULL

  54. Trev 07/31/08

    Dogpile has to rank up there.

  55. babymerce 07/31/08

    gelf.com

    forcing google + shelf into a very bad brand name.

    imagine a blue g
    a red e
    a yellow l
    a blue f

    and of course an elf holding a book.

  56. cabrown11 07/31/08

    My entry:

    "Trogdor!"

    1. SFW
    2. 2 Syllabels (trog-dor)
    3. Pronouncable (see above)

  57. designbot 07/31/08

    Rlrl.com: Your first stop for reliable reference and learning.

  58. cabrown11 07/31/08

    ... oh and for those unaware:

    Homestar Runner - Trogdor Video

  59. julienstockwell 07/31/08

    I feel pretty confident about this one:

    Zune

  60. james 07/31/08

    TzCah

  61. TechStuff 07/31/08

    How about "Orkut"? Or is that too obvious?

  62. Tuco 07/31/08

    It's more than three syllables, but I think Dan Lyons (a.k.a "Fake Steve Jobs") hit the nail on the head last year:

    http://iamnotstevejobs.blogspot.com/2007/02/john-doerrs-new-company.html

  63. tragicallyhip 07/31/08

    I know most people will think I'm crazy, but...

    Verizon

    ...is a terrible brand. Remember when they launched it after the merger of GTE and BellAtlantic? No one could pronounce it. Thought it was "ver-AH-zahn" not "va-RI-zahn." And that logo. Yikes.

    Just goes to prove that branding can be 10% creative genius and 90% protocol.

  64. Anauel 07/31/08

    Googlecubration

    Wordplay of Google and Lucubration, which means any literary effort, esp. of a pretentious or solemn nature.

  65. shamste 07/31/08

    dot.com

  66. yuriq 07/31/08

    "ELUSIVE KNOLEDGE"

  67. sglewis 07/31/08

    How about learnt.com as in "hey i learnt about it over at google learnt cuz theyz cool"

  68. loki 07/31/08

    phamthe

  69. Pixellust 07/31/08

    Popl

    Pooh-ple

    or People, which ever. Dropped a letter or two...

  70. Stompy 07/31/08

    koolbloo (dot com)

    2 syllables
    A restaurant. Isn't it obvious?

  71. chrisgregory 07/31/08

    How about:

    Hittla

    Chris

  72. HelgeG 07/31/08

    spam. a perfectly good brand name, forever spoiled by a monthy python sketch and junk email.

  73. crzymke 07/31/08

    enE

    (pronounced like "any")

    Some thoughts on its awfulness:
    -2 syllables, sloppy spelling.
    -it just sounds nasally and unpleasant
    -ene.com already links to an environmental sustainability company
    -try slipping those two syllables into a conversation w.o any confusion
    -just seeing E-N-E doesn't imply its proper pronunciation.

  74. Ric 07/31/08

    I got two for you
    http://www.Free.TV Free Television - everyone always thinks it is FreeTV.Com
    http://www.beaf.com - 'what's your beaf' a Digg clone - we have to spell it for people not to think beef

  75. Rory 07/31/08

    Glib

    for Google Library.

  76. frend 07/31/08

    Wisdoh

    pronounced: wizdo

    "A unit of Wisdom"

  77. jasong 07/31/08

    rexam.

    you'd hope that after 125 years of proctology jokes, they'd have thought of something better.

  78. genius 07/31/08

    Phlegm

    -Philadelphia General Managers, Inc

  79. john 07/31/08

    Monday

    see http://articles.techrepublic.com.com/5100-10878_11-1038748.html

  80. bobbobbob 07/31/08

    @sglewis What's so bad/funny about learnt? I'm confused.

  81. kinetix 07/31/08

    Grok - It has a G at the beginning, it embodies the notion of understanding, it symbolizes taking in large amounts of info, large amounts of info can make one's ego grow exponentially or It could be copyrighted, but who reads books

  82. Daniel Tunkelang 07/31/08

    Gook(s) = Google Books

  83. Chuis 07/31/08

    "Pfuw" = /fuhw/

    Like Pfafftown, only more hayseed and less anunciation.

    Todd

  84. gnostix1 07/31/08

    eNuff

    Add a tilde and get ~eNuff ("not enough" in boolean) So cute it makes my teeth hurt.

  85. catchthis 07/31/08

    _
    nLit
    Pronounced enlight.
    Cheesy enough even for Google.

  86. jimwhimpey 07/31/08

    Pneumnem

    Pronounced new-nem. Like the "pneu" from pneumatic and "mnem" from mnemonics.

  87. AndyLee 07/31/08

    Offhand I can't think of worse name for Knol than the name they chose for themselves. But in the general annals of bad product names I'll never forget the i.beat blaxx: http://www.engadget.com/2007/08/24/trekstor-showcases-i-beat-blaxx-portable-media-player/

  88. mstone.yawp 07/31/08

    - Wii

    - 'squirting' in the Zune sense

    - WinCE

    The initial reaction to 'Wii' was, shall we say, less than kind. Hasn't seemed to hurt sales, though. A good product can survive a weird name, which seems particularly relevant here.

    'Squirting' is more a branded message or brand image than a brand name per se, but its rollout still has to rank as one of the great 'what were they smoking?' moments of 21st century marketing.

    And I've always just gotten a chuckle out of 'WinCE'.

  89. EMAILBEN145 07/31/08

    Palringo.

  90. blakegli 07/31/08

    Three that I made up for fun:

    1) Gnarl
    2) Qyou
    3) Phyl

  91. mitch42 07/31/08

    Here's a new search engine for you:

    Goghphor

    (Go For)

    Enough silent letters in there for you?

  92. djparis 07/31/08

    Great post! I take it you meant a brand that had actually launched.

    One of my "favorites" was kozmo.com, one of those get-anything-in-an-hour urban delivery sites back in the late 90s.

    You could never just say it when you recommended it to friends; you ALWAYS had to spell it afterwards. It was so annoying.

    And they didn't bother checking who owned cosmo.com, or kozmo.com or cozmo.com.

    Ah, the bad ol' days.

  93. tsmyther 07/31/08

    Staying with the "knowledge" theme, here's one:

    nozit

    For extra points, you could prepend it with a silent "k", but that would prevent it getting mistaken as an acne medication company.

    While this is pronouncable (knows it), those words suffer the same fate of any elided sibilent - it can be on either word or on both.

    ice cream = I scream
    it's not = it's snot
    Bo knows = Bono's

    But nozit.com could take off like the "Bo Knows" commercials, so it could actually be a great brand name. Maybe I need to take a trip to godaddy....

  94. Conga 07/31/08

    GOOL (pronounce CUIL)

  95. Zman 07/31/08

    Vaio

    wtf.

  96. susanbdot 07/31/08

    For me, it has to be:

    Me.com

    That's the most dreadful name I can imagine, and it's been forced on me... almost. At least I can remain myself@mac.com, instead of having to accept myself@me.com.

    But... Me.com... It makes me think of certain online services of years ago. Or even some still extant web gateways. Me, Me, Meeeee! Look at MY stuff. (Some of which remains surprisingly unconfigurable by ME. Hmmph)

    It makes me feel as if I should be about 10 years old.

    Uck.

  97. Frito 07/31/08

    Orkut... but someone already said that. Stickam? Xanga?

  98. TheNameInspector 07/31/08

    Thetus

  99. Fran 07/31/08

    1) Nollidge - in the tradition of Google, a misspelled version of "googol." Pronoucable and dumb.

    2) Breyn - same as above

  100. ottojschlosser 07/31/08

    "Rejaw" - some kind of new blogging service. It sounds really painful... "Sorry, but it looks like we'll have to rejaw."

  101. Nika 07/31/08

    AcipHex- When you pronounce it, it sounds like "ass effects" http://www.aciphex.com/
    When my hubs and I heard this commercial, we both started laughing uncontrollably. Who on earth could have thought of such a terrible name???