At his keynote @ ecomXpo presentation earlier + also mentioned the squidoo beta coming soon,
I think we should wait and see what is shaped from the project cause Mr. Godin DO HAVE quite an impressive crowd of listeners (in number and in quality) and may take this a step forward than the existing apps.

everybody and his dog has a blog network...

You know, I like catchy short names and all, but Squidoo? WTF?

From AIGA Journal

This one seems to be the latter...

Godin is responding to the response to the name Squidoo

If I had a choice between a killer domain with a generic word in it or a great word that led to a less than perfect domain, I'd take the first, every time.

The second thing that's happening with the explosion of made-up unique names is that the very structure of the word now communicates meaning. Web 2.0 names often have missing (or extra) vowels. The "oo" double o is a great way to communicate a certain something about a net company.

"HRKom" doesn't sound like the same kind of company as, say, "Jeteye". This is all very irrational, artsy fartsy stuff, and it's also important.

Altria and Achieva and Factiva and Kalera all sound like companies invented by naming firms. Which is a fine signal to send to Wall Street, but nothing you'd want to name your kid or your web 2.0 company.

The shift, then, is from what the words mean to what the words remind you of. The structure of the words, the way they sound, the memes they recall... all go into making a great name. Starbucks is made of two words that have nothing at all to do with coffee (except for their profits!) and the reference to Moby Dick is tenuous for most of us. But over time, the shape of the letters, the way they sound and the unique quality of the word makes it close to perfect.

I have a lot of respect for the godin. Even though I have disagreed with him as much as been inspired ;O) Names are a funny thing as any parent or person who has tried to name a company lately will tell you. Thing is, child or company, it's not what you name it at the beginning that tends to matter more what that name means as an adult or mature company. As in the case of starbucks, ebay, google, xerox .. you can't argue with the profits so the names don't sound so daft. boo.com is still a crap name but it's ok to say that now they are a footnote in the dotcom history books ;O)

I certainly agree with this:

But Squidoo is just ugly sounding. And have you seen that strange squid on his site? Blech.

The more I read about this squidoo thing, the more I think Mr. Godin is trying to pull a fast one on the Internet public. Like this is one big joke and he wants to see how much press and publicity he can get out of the most silliest idea, name, and website, and then show the world how gullible they are. Wouldn't that make for an awesome next book? (I've often thought of doing something like that myself when I see how the press eats up the stupidest of the stupid ideas.)

If it's not that then maybe he's just on crack?

That's just a matter of familiarity. "Starbucks" is a perfect word to describe shops that sell over-roasted coffee and show up absolutely everywhere because Starbucks is a chain of shops that sell over-roasted coffee and show up absolutely everywhere. It's come to perfectly mean that because that's what it is.

And couldn't that claim be made about any name? Every word is unique. Is it possible for "boy" and "boy" to be two different words? Of course not. A word is a concept represented by a combination of characters and a combination of sounds, which serve to communicate a meaning. Even homonyms and homographs differ from eachother in either spelling or pronounciation, in addition to meaning -- if they didn't they'd be the same word.

And why he uses Starbucks, which he notes is not a neologism, as a way of supporting his neologism is beyond me.

Eh what?

Did I ramble on a bit there?

My point about Starbucks meaning whatever it means to a given person is that familiarity is what will cause anyone to develop an association with any word. The first time you heard the word "Starbucks" did you think of the same thing that you think of now? I don't remember that glorious moment in history, but I expect I either thought of Moby Dick or Battlestar Galactica.

There's nothing about "Starbucks" or "Squidoo" that make that process of familiarizing and association unique. It happens with every word you learn, including every brand you learn.

All I can think of at the moment when I see/hear Squidoo is Squid Poop. (The logo seems to be consistent with this!)

I think Jill is on to somthing here.

...show the world how gullible they are.

Squid Poop

Not that I want to feed the troll (Godin, that is), but this caught my eye:

(you know, those $1000 interactive days certain SEO types spent to met Seth Godin and disuss their businesses and business plans?)

I "don't know" - at least I didn't ;-) But it explains why Mr Godin is all of a sudden everywhere. Honestly, I never expected to hear his name in these circles. For that reason, I've been surprised quite a few times the last few weeks.

However, John, you're perfectly right (imho) that the guys and girls in these circles might be able to teach Mr. Godin a trick or two. Probably even involuntarily. The squid does sound like a "search engine + ads" business model to me. Very much so.