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Change Your Name

paulgraham.com

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41–50 of 355 posts

Re: Change Your Name

#41

Post by hyperpallium »

arihant wrote: post #22

> 100% of the top 20 YC companies by valuation have the .com of their name. 94% of the top 50 do. But only 66% of companies in the current batch have the .com of their name. Which suggests there are lessons ahead for most of the rest, one way or another. I wonder how much of that is due to the fact that landscape has changed in past 8 years and top 20 YC companies are all at least a few years (5-ish?) old. I apprecia…

yes, didn't dropbox used to be trydropbox.com? And, tho non-YC, delicious.com was del.icio.us (or something). Successful companies can buy their domain.

But I agree with pg; a startup by any other name would succeed as sweet, so why not choose one you can get.

Re: Change Your Name

#43

Post by [deleted] »

jnpatel wrote: post #24
iiiggglll wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A great example: how long did it take Square to get their hands on square.com? Even now it's just a redirect to squareup.com.

Another example: Dropbox originally had getdropbox.com, and didn't obtain dropbox.com until more than 2 years after founding. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dropbox_(service)#2007-2011

[deleted]

Re: Change Your Name

#44

Post by blazespin »

arihant wrote: post #22

> 100% of the top 20 YC companies by valuation have the .com of their name. 94% of the top 50 do. But only 66% of companies in the current batch have the .com of their name. Which suggests there are lessons ahead for most of the rest, one way or another. I wonder how much of that is due to the fact that landscape has changed in past 8 years and top 20 YC companies are all at least a few years (5-ish?) old. I apprecia…

I made the same mental mistake as you just did and which I now bet PG thought about and carefully dismissed. Correlation isn't causation, but the fact is the top 20 companies either started with or changed their name. Which is his thesis.

Re: Change Your Name

#45

Post by rubiquity »

zyxley wrote: post #38
rubiquity wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've done some scuba and I don't get the Lemon Pie name in that context. Care to explain?

It's the whole point of the linked article. > The LESS it has to do with your category, the better.

Apparently I'm still really, really bad at this.

Re: Change Your Name

#46

Post by ploxiln »

hyperpallium wrote: post #41
arihant wrote: post #22

> 100% of the top 20 YC companies by valuation have the .com of their name. 94% of the top 50 do. But only 66% of companies in the current batch have the .com of their name. Which suggests there are lessons ahead for most of the rest, one way or another. I wonder how much of that is due to the fact that landscape has changed in past 8 years and top 20 YC companies are all at least a few years (5-ish?) old. I apprecia…

yes, didn't dropbox used to be trydropbox.com? And, tho non-YC, delicious.com was del.icio.us (or something). Successful companies can buy their domain. But I agree with pg; a startup by any other name would succeed as sweet, so why not choose one you can get.

del.icio.us is an awesome domain. I'd be inclined to believe someone came up with the domain before the name.

Re: Change Your Name

#47

Post by blazespin »

rjvir wrote: post #33

> 100% of the top 20 YC companies by valuation have the .com of their name. 94% of the top 50 do. But only 66% of companies in the current batch have the .com of their name. That's not a straight comparison. A better stat would be, what percentage of the top 20 YC companies had the .com while they were in the active YC batch?

No, because his thesis is "change your name", not "start out with .com"

Re: Change Your Name

#48

Post by tptacek »

arihant wrote: post #22

> 100% of the top 20 YC companies by valuation have the .com of their name. 94% of the top 50 do. But only 66% of companies in the current batch have the .com of their name. Which suggests there are lessons ahead for most of the rest, one way or another. I wonder how much of that is due to the fact that landscape has changed in past 8 years and top 20 YC companies are all at least a few years (5-ish?) old. I apprecia…

What also bugs me is that there are probably things that:

(1) successful companies do often,

(2) marginal companies do less often, and

(3) aren't actually in any way instrumental to success.

It could just be that there's a mindset among successful founders that produces a particular vector of decisions, not all of which are all that important.

Graham would probably respond: whether every component of that vector is important or not, investors are scraping for every bit of evidence they can find, and your name might be a "tell" that other components of your decision vector are hinky.

And that might be true enough, but cargo culting every decision Airbnb makes in order to slip through an investor filter is no way to live either.

Re: Change Your Name

#49

Post by dpcan »

sivers wrote: post #14

Best advice I've ever seen on naming a business is from this old Seth Godin gem: http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2003/06/naming_a_bus... I read that in 2003, and have never forgotten the "Lemon Pie" example since.

I was developing websites in 2003, so I feel like I should be able to relate here, but he has this comment at the bottom that I can't figure out...

"Use a stock photo CD and find cool pictures that match your name BEFORE you pick the name. If you can find a bunch of $30 images that work with a name, grab the pictures, then the name."

Huh?

Re: Change Your Name

#50

Post by toephu2 »

ThomPete wrote: post #13

Great names are made not found. I think Paul for once have it the wrong way around. If you become big enough and happen to have enough of a market you might need to .com name to optimize your numbers. If you happen to find a good name you can afford that you still think represents you and is .com you should most probably change your name. But for most people just like their logo it's it's not that important until you…

and even when you stay big, your brand name is big enough that your domain doesn't matter (e.g., teslamotors.com)
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