It is a long tradition

When the conglomerate oil company of a thousand names wanted just one they paid a similar group study many millions of dollars to search for a new name that was not a Swahili curse word or something, and they decided that no word had two X's in it in any language and so spent many more millions of dollars in everything from road signs to business cards only to have the first comments be "Oh yes Exxon the sign of the double cross" and so it has ever been.

In a similar vein General Motors was confused that their Chevy Nova sold well to speakers of English but to Latins hardly at all till someone pointed out that no va means won't go in Spanish.

And pity the poor Russian Astrophysicists trying to explain about Black Holes in space when the translation to Russian had most unfortunate slang connotations as well and discussions had a hard time avoiding terrible sexual references.

I think something similar happened when Kraft tried to sell their "Big Johns Pork and Beans" to French Canadians. I am sure there are hundreds more such stories.

I suppose there is even a name for first time Bing users as well.

Mother Jones - Comments for "Re: Bing, Drum, Ford, &amp; Jacko"

It is a long tradition

Mother Jones - Comments for "Re: Bing, Drum, Ford, & Jacko"