Wednesday, March 15, 2006

OneCleveland or OneCommunity?

I know that the OneCleveland is expanding to Akron and other venues outside of the traditional “Cleveland” geography but I wish they had kept the name OneCleveland.

Can you imagine if a project was developed, spearheaded, financed and brought to fruition in say Boston or Detroit and the name was changed to exclude the home city? It just wouldn’t happen.

I think I am sensitive to how Akron, Canton and beyond might feel but this was a Cleveland project and I think it dilutes the credit and prestige that Cleveland has earned. If Akron people and orgs had developed the project and we wanted to tap into it, I would expect to refer to OneAkron. I wouldn’t expect a name change.

OneCommunity sounds bland and amorphous to me and smacks of political correctness. How can we build an identity and civic pride if we bend in the wind like this?

So far visitors to the Great Lakes Geek site have felt the same way as 90% of voters say they do not like the new name.

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