[kde-community] Renaming KScreenGenie

[Eike Hein]

On 09/01/2015 10:08 PM, Boudhayan Gupta wrote:
> Ladies and gentlemen, I'll take a decision on this in the next couple
> of days. As it stands now, Pixie is a universal favourite but we can't
> use it for copyright reasons.
> 
> Kapture seems to have the most number of votes, so if nothing changes
> I'll go with that.


I'd like to object to using Kapture for a number of reasons
... apologies for getting involved at this late hour, I was
on vacation for most of this thread :)

* The forcibly-inject-a-K naming scheme used to offer some
  utility in the form of communicating to users that an
  application was meant to use in a KDE workspace, and would
  work well in it. Through various efforts (cross-desktop
  standardization via freedesktop.org, KDE's porting efforts,
  even our rebranding exercise) we've moved beyond that in
  need and spirit, and largely only negatives remain - such
  as its gimmicky nature and bad reputation. I think the app
  is great and it would be unfortunate for its rollout to be
  overshadowed by a reaction to this backwards-oriented
  name.

* It's not very memorable. Verb-based names don't easily
  imprint as a thing.

* It doesn't sound pleasant and feels out of character due
  to many strong consonants and the snap of the first
  syllable. It doesn't sound approachable or nimble, it
  sounds serious and heavy-duty. Note these kinds of things
  transfer to a great degree across language spheres (cf.
  the Bouba-Kiki effect).


Personally I'm a big fan of the "Selfie" suggestion:

* It's clever and funny (the computer taking a self-portrait).

* For those who can't take the word seriously - it also works
  tongue-in-cheek. It's not a fad, though; a word for the
  concept was needed, this it it, there won't be another
  (with the exception of Korea's "selca" for self-camera,
  perhaps). It's won.

* Selfie is a artifact of globally interconnected culture,
  it's familiar to many non-English-speakers and not nerdy,
  while capture is advanced English and fairly technical and
  unapproachable.

* It's an opportunity to appropriate a mainstream word for
  our purposes before anyone else really does. Those don't
  come along that often.

* It sounds pleasant due to weaker consonants and i/e
  vowels. Cats would like this name. (But admittedly some
  language spheres can't pronounce f well.)


Cheers,
Eike