Tokoni – Tongan for “Help”: Naming Backstories

I read in today’s paper about the public launch of Tokoni, a one-stop destination for storytelling – on all kinds of topics, in all kinds of styles. I’ve been thinking a lot about Web 2.0-style company names, of which this is obviously one; it’s non-English, short, easy to spell and pronounce, and has a backstory that makes sense. Kind of like a new name we once created for eBay – Kijiji, the name for their global version of Craigslist. It was a great project – we got to work with Meg Whitman and Alex Kazim…who turns out to be one of the founders of Tokoni! Maybe I’m reading into it too much, but I’d like to think that he learned a little about company naming from us. Tokoni looks very interesting, and we wish him the best in this new venture.