SoylentNews

mrbluze writes:

After several early attempts, we have settled on a process for deciding on the final name for this site currently known as SoylentNews.org. You'll need to log in and go to: userprefs/homepage and check the box marked "Willing to Vote" if you'd like to participate (do this now, the submission round will go out soon). The vote will occur using an email-based solution loosely based on the Debian/Condercet method that we cooked up. Note: checking this box will indicate that we are scraping your email address from the database for participation (this is completely opt-in). If you wish not to participate, just make sure this box is unchecked (this is the default).

We are opening the floor to name suggestions. If you have suggested a name earlier, you'll need to re-submit it through this email voting system. Though we prefer available domains, if you have pre-purchased a domain (eg: to prevent squatters), by submitting the name you are stating that you are the owner of the domain(s) and will give it without strings attached to this project if it were to be chosen.

The criteria for an acceptable name:

• Unique and free of obvious trademarks
• Ideally be a bit technological/geeky and signal the site is "news"
• Domain should be available in all permutations: .com/.net/.org
• Easy to pronounce
• Easy to type
• Easy to 'market' or has a "hook" (imagine a mug with the name, a logo, slogans, plays on words, etc.)
• Passes the girlfriend / wife / significant other / random person at work - test

This is how it will work:

1. The first round will go out asking for name submissions
2. Submissions will remain open for 7 days
3. The community will vote to yield 5 names
4. Staff will vote and produce 5 names
5. A final vote on all 10 names will be held
6. At this point, the staff will have a second full vote on the same ten items the community voted on
7. The result of this vote, and the community vote, including its runoff, will then be published
8. The staff vote is the final decision. We have to live with this. But the community will have a powerful influence on the final staff vote.

If you're interested:

• Notes on the voting system
• Wiki page with the full plan

NCommander adds: So its finally here, and I wanted to apologize for the long delay before this actually happened. To the editoral team, please bump this to the top of the index for the next 24 hours so everyone gets a chance to see it (click 'fastforward' then save to autoupdate the timestamp). I promise a Featured Story option is coming in the next major update so we don't have to deal with this!