OpenAI's choice to name new models 'Terra' and 'Luna' after a notorious cryptocurrency scam highlights a significant branding disconnect. This tone-deaf naming could erode trust with enterprise customers unfamiliar with or wary of the crypto space, associating their flagship products with financial collapse and fraud.

AI companies are intentionally branding themselves with names of common grocery items like Jalapeno, Avocado, and Broccoli. This strategy aims to counteract the 'artificial' nature of AI by associating it with the natural, familiar, and non-threatening qualities of food, potentially increasing user comfort and adoption.

ChatGPT's tendency to use words like 'delve' isn't random. Its training creates a bias for Latin-derived words over their simpler Germanic counterparts (e.g., 'dig in') because they sound more prestigious and authoritative to the model.

Naming AI research teams with terms like "AGI" is more about signaling a long-term "north star" and creating "vibes" to attract ambitious talent, rather than reflecting a concrete, step-by-step plan to achieve artificial general intelligence.

The battle for AI dominance isn't just about technology, but about language. Companies like Google (with Gemini) and OpenAI (with ChatGPT) are competing to make their product name the default verb for AI interaction, similar to how "Google it" became synonymous with search.

Google's AI product suite suffers from a confusing and fragmented branding strategy, with numerous distinct names like Gemini, Antigravity, AI Studio, Flow, Omni, Stitch, and Pomelli. This lack of a unified brand identity makes it difficult for users to navigate the ecosystem and understand how the different tools relate to one another.

In the early days, Synthesia and peers decided "Generative AI" sounded too geeky and collectively chose to brand the space as "Synthetic Media." They later regretted this as "Generative AI" became the dominant term, costing them significant SEO advantages and brand association built over four years.

In 2015-2016, major tech companies actively avoided the term "AI," fearing it was tainted from previous "AI winters." It wasn't until around 2017 that branding as an "AI company" became a positive signal, highlighting the incredible speed of the recent AI revolution and shift in public perception.

After years of underperformance, the 'Siri' name is synonymous with incompetence. Even with a complete technological overhaul, the brand carries too much negative equity. Apple may need to launch its new AI assistant under a different name to escape the perception of failure.