Worst name ever?

[Mitlov]

I know it's not THAT important in the grand scheme of things, but I can't help but think that Samsung dropped the ball on naming the Ativ S.

(1) You don't know how to pronounce it just by looking at it.

(2) It's not evocative. "Galaxy" is evocative. "Ford Mustang" is evocative. Ativ, not so much.

(3) For a company recently under fire for allegedly taking other company's intellectual property...they take another company's mobile device (Vita) and spell it backward? Were there no other words on planet earth to choose from?

Thoughts?

 

[the_thunderbird]

Agree on all counts. Product names do play a certain importance for marketing obviously. ATIV is ugly to say and looks like a technical code rather than the consumer release title. Hopefully there is some genuine marketing around this device which can make up for some of this, but an OS without wide notoriety combined with an ugly device name is a bad combination!

 

[Mitlov]

Also, Vita means "life." The opposite of life is...death? Who wants to buy a phone named the Samsung Death?

This isn't quite as bad as Chevy selling the Nova in Latin American countries ("no va" means "it doesn't go"), but it's still hard to fathom. Something must have gotten lost in translation.

 

[palandri]

Also, Vita means "life." The opposite of life is...death? Who wants to buy a phone named the Samsung Death?

This isn't quite as bad as Chevy selling the Nova in Latin American countries ("no va" means "it doesn't go"), but it's still hard to fathom. Something must have gotten lost in translation.

LOL! I think you're putting too much thought into it.

No va also means it doesn't run in French, but I doubt they would look at the word Nova that way.

 

[Matthew Mazzenga]

The opposite of life is...death? Who wants to buy a phone named the Samsung Death?

Actually, that makes me like it even more!

 

[eric12341]

I've spoken with a few people about it and they thought the name was cool. It can also mean alive because the windows phone interface is alive due to the live tiles.

 

[GoodThings2Life]

I think it's a terrible name, but then again WTF is an EVO (rhetorical)? I thought that was a dumb name too, so maybe that's more of the vain they're going for with ATIV.

At the end of the day, it's all about promotion... and are people going to be talking about this cool phone they saw on a TV ad?

 

[Mitlov]

I think it's a terrible name, but then again WTF is an EVO? I thought that was a dumb name too, so maybe that's more of the vain they're going for with ATIV.

At the end of the day, it's all about promotion... and are people going to be talking about this cool phone they saw on a TV ad?

An EVO (all caps, just those three letters) is the common abbreviation of the Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution, arguably the most awesome sport-compact of all time, and certainly the most boy-racer-esque car of all time. The name is a holy icon for the sideways-hat crowd in the way that the Camaro is an icon to the mullet crowd. Mitsubishi has spent twenty years cultivating the "EVO" name, and it blows my mind that Mitsubishi wasn't even a little irked at Samsung grabbing the name to appeal to youth. I mean, GM would have squaked if it was called the "Samsung Corvette," right?

 

[GoodThings2Life]

An EVO (all caps, just those three letters) is the common abbreviation of the Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution....

I was referring to the HTC EVO brand on Sprint. Kinda like how Verizon calls all of their Android phones "Droid".

If Samsung wants to use ATIV as their WP brand, that's cool. It's a weird name, but it can grow on me if they make it something important to people. I sure hope they do.

 

[Mitlov]

I was referring to the HTC EVO brand on Sprint.

EDIT: Never mind, I kept missing that the "EVO" was an HTC and not a Samsung.

 

[Duvi]

I think it's a terrible name, but then again WTF is an EVO? I thought that was a dumb name too, so maybe that's more of the vain they're going for with ATIV.

At the end of the day, it's all about promotion... and are people going to be talking about this cool phone they saw on a TV ad?

It stands for Evolution. First device with 4G (WiMax).

 

[snowmutt]

No, I was among the first to dump on the name. Odyssey was a GREAT name for a set of devices. I asked before: Who started the unwritten rule that you had to change the device name when it got launched?

By the time it gets launched, especially with all of those Samsung Tablets bearing the ATIV name, it will be something we are just used to. Maybe we could come up with fun acronyms?

Android
Toppled
Instantly &
Victoriously

 

[anodynamic]

Now that I've looked at it more than twice, it also got me to relate to AcTIVe. Maybe it's because ATIV would be pronounced more like the the word "aktiv" in Swedish (and also in German and probably several more languages that also use a variation of the same basic word).

 

[scottcraft]

I think it's a horrible name, but after we hear it a thousand times or so we will think it's normal.

 

[HeyCori]

An EVO (all caps, just those three letters) is the common abbreviation of the Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution, arguably the most awesome sport-compact of all time, and certainly the most boy-racer-esque car of all time. The name is a holy icon for the sideways-hat crowd in the way that the Camaro is an icon to the mullet crowd. Mitsubishi has spent twenty years cultivating the "EVO" name, and it blows my mind that Mitsubishi wasn't even a little irked at Samsung grabbing the name to appeal to youth. I mean, GM would have squaked if it was called the "Samsung Corvette," right?

The HTC Evo
The HTC Accord

Oh my god, I'm starting to see a pattern.

Are there any cars named Titan? lol

As for Ativ... it's pretty bad.

Seriously, Ativ sounds like a fitness program, not a cell phone.

 

[anodynamic]

The HTC Evo
The HTC Accord

Oh my god, I'm starting to see a pattern.

Are there any cars named Titan? lol

As for Ativ... it's pretty bad.

Seriously, Ativ sounds like a fitness program, not a cell phone.

Latest rumor is that the Accord will be known as 8X. I really hope that's a carrier specific name, because it's even duller than HD7.

But, if we continue on the patterns... shouldn't the Radar be replaced with a Hawkeye..?

 

[GoodThings2Life]

Are there any cars named Titan? lol

Yep... Nissan Titan is their full-size pickup truck.

 

[Mitlov]

The HTC Evo
The HTC Accord

Oh my god, I'm starting to see a pattern.

Are there any cars named Titan? lol

2012 Nissan Titan Truck | Nissan USA

 

[textomatic]

I like Ativ. It sound luxurious.

 

[iloveamystery]

I like the way Ativ is pronounced, but I agree that one wouldn't naturally expect to pronounce it that way. Just have a listen to the latest Windows Weekly podcast. It also does look (on paper, screen, or what have you) more like a code name. They probably could have done better.