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Comment by duiker101 | Hacker News Reader

well... i didn't know that google was so short on money that needed a sponsored release...

I would guess they came up with the idea of kitkat and contacted Nestle for permission to use the name and likely Nestle saw a good opportunity to use it as marketing.

Obviously just speculation on my part, but seems more likely (to me) than Google actively trying to get sponsorship on a code name.

This takes silly version names to a whole new level.

I guess it makes sense for an ad company to sell naming rights to some extent, but I can't think of another occurrence of google mixing it's branding like this before. Google historically set themselves apart by keeping ads somewhat separate.

It isn't branding, though. These are effectively code names, and outside of humorous shortcuts they don't really matter.

It is a funny name...and I do have to wonder whether they actually got paid for this.

> This takes silly version names to a whole new level.

I don't know, I think the alphabetical releases are quite useful to make the chronology clear, second only to numbered versions.

More likely is someone chose this name, that conveniently starts with a K, and then they sought out the owners of KitKat to make sure they were okay with it. I'm sure they were, free advertising.

It's a cross-promotion. Google gets to promote its devices on the Kit Kat label and Nestle gets Google pumping its candy. No reason to assume any money changed hands. Google may well have paid Nestle.

"This is not a money-changing-hands kind of deal," - John Lagerling, director of Android global partnerships - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-23926938

The explanation might be simpler than you're suggesting. When a registered trademark is used by someone other than the person holding the trademark, it's often allowed if the use is in an unrelated domain -- in this case, computer software, not candy. Because this doesn't confuse the public or hurt the originator's business, often there's no complaint.

That's a good point, but in this case it's questionable since Google has been specifically naming their OS's after candy.

But the fact that Google has been favoring food names doesn't change the basic idea, that those uses won't confuse the public who are in the market for the other kind of ice cream sandwich.

Either that or Google thinks Android market share in Japan needs a boost...

Google told the BBC that it had come up with the idea and that neither side was paying the other.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-23926938

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