I'm aware of that discussion, but thanks for pointing to it. I do not, however, feel that it has been "discussed at length" since most of the discussion centers about a proposal to merge all projects into Wikipedia. That is rightly opposed as being harmful to the projects and also seems not to be doable for technical and licensing reasons.
My proposal about changing the name of the Foundation and put Wikipedia in front of the projects' names is in line with Erics excellent 2007-paper about "rethinking brands":
http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/foundation-l/2007-May/029991.html [http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/foundation-l/2007-May/029991.html]
It is a major task to communicate the setup around Wikimedia, Wikipedia and the projects to the entire world. It requires the effort to be focused and the message to be simple, and we are lucky to be able to use the Wikipedia brand as a motor for that.
I see that some people think about such a move as being purely a "marketing gimmick". That attitude fails to appreciate the enormous value of such "marketing" for donors, contributors, readers, and the distribution of knowledge in general. I.e. in short: For our mission.
A change of the naming of the Foundation and our projects does not interfere with the projects themselves. They will keep their present position, policies, and self-governance, but adding Wikipedia in front of their name in my judgement has a potential big benefit for them as well.
Regards, Sir48/Thyge
----- Original meddelelse -----
Fra: Federico Leva (Nemo) nemowiki@gmail.com [mailto:nemowiki@gmail.com]
It's been discussed at length: http://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Proposal:Brand_name_consolidation
Nemo
2010/12/10 < dex2000@pc.dk [compose.cgi?to=dex2000@pc.dk]>:
I was about to write a suggestion similar to the one indicated by Ziko van Dijk. I second it and recommend that the following be given serious consideration:
Change as soon as practically possible the naming of the Foundation to the "Wikipedia Foundation" and the naming of the projects to Wikipedia, Wikipedia Commons, Wikipedia Books, Wikipedia Wiktionary etc. That
would
simplify matters enormously while at the same time broadening the Wikipedia brand to all projects in a much more effective and comprehensible way. Regards, Sir48/Thyge, da:wiki