Hacker News Reader

You submitted this yesterday, with already-significant discussion on it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8279982

Yes, you really need to change that name.

> What is Hooli? Excellent question! Hear it straight from our CIO Gavin Belson here.

That's not an "easter egg." That's infringement.

If you notice, it's available to try out today (and hence the new post :-) ).

About the name, we don't see that being a problem -- hopefully, not now at least. We see it as an easter egg in good humour.

When did we stop having fun as an industry?

Who cares if their name is from a show? They'd hardly be the first business to do so, I'd wager.

There's a difference between using a reference as a one-off joke (as a parody, a la Saturday Night Live) and using a reference as the core branding of your money-making business.

What's another business that derived their product or company name directly from a TV show or movie? Just curious.

Soylent is the first one that comes to mind.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com