My company, Biteback Publishing, has encountered something of a quandary. We’re soon to begin distributing our books in the US but there’s a problem. Apparently Biteback in the US is synonymous with a notoriously militant animal rights organization, so our friendly distributors across the pond have suggested we use a new customer facing name there.
My colleague, Katy Scholes, decided to do a little snooping to see whether Bite Back US were really all that militant or if we could get away with keeping the name. She found the Bite Back website and was greeted on the front page by a picture of three hooded youths in balaclavas hugging basset hounds and a ferret looking nothing short of p***ed off next to a burnt out car.
Hello. Pleased to meet you.
Dialogue, call us Dialogue (in the States that is).
I wonder what Bite Back would have made of the cat in a bin incident yesterday...
That would be "Dialog" of course.
ReplyDeletePoor Cat in the Bin! Bet a lot more people will start doing that now it's been made public.
ReplyDeleteI am waiting for the cat-in-a-bin virals to start appearing on the interwebs...
Change your trading name to BackBite.
ReplyDeleteAnd please can you tell me why on your links you promote such a homophobic crowd as Guido Fawkes?
And now you just have the small task of educating Americans in the correct spelling of 'dialogue' ;)
ReplyDeleteCan you fix their use of 'aluminum' at the same time.
Good luck in the US, you're playing with the big boys now.
Wouldn't it be Dialog in the States?
ReplyDeleteBrokeback?
ReplyDeleteThat direct action website will wonder why their 'hits' are shooting up today! And 'US' would look too much like 'bite us'...
ReplyDeleteNew name needed?
Hardball Publishing
Feedback Publishing
TP Publishing
Iain said "She found the Bite Back website and was greeted on the front page by a picture of three hooded youths in balaclavas hugging basset hounds and a ferret looking nothing short of p***ed off next to a burnt out car.
ReplyDeleteSounds like Liverpool on a Friday night to me.
To be honest, I'm surprised you haven't already changed the name of the company to Iain Dale Media or something like that. So I suggest that's your next step. I doubt there's an Iain Dale in the USA synonymous with anything as dubious as that.
Bite US Back?
ReplyDeleteShould it not be "Dialog" for the States? They may think you are French otherwise.
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ReplyDeleteI wonder what Bite Back would have made of the cat in a bin incident yesterday...
Soup, mayhap?
I imagine they'd want the death penalty for it.
ReplyDeleteHow about British Political or BP?
ReplyDeleteTrevorsden said "And please can you tell me why on your links you promote such a homophobic crowd as Guido Fawkes?"
ReplyDelete*sigh*
A certain blog being featured on a blogroll does not imply agreement with everything on the blog being linked to. To put it another way - Iain Dale is not responsible for the contents of third party websites. Every blogger follows the same principle. Do keep up.
Never mind 'dialog'. How are we spelling 'quandary'?
ReplyDeleteiCowboy said...
ReplyDeleteCan you fix their use of 'aluminum' at the same time.
On dodgy ground there: they deserve a slap for colour/color and all the rest of their stupid spellings but on aluminum they are using the original spelling!
Sigh ! I know all that.
ReplyDeleteSpan Ows - there is only one spelling of aluminium. Cowboy was referring to the pronunciation as aluminum - al-oom-in-um.
ReplyDeleteA move towards simplified spelling is inevitable as the concept of teaching grammar and spelling wanes away. We are moving back to the very times when Dr. Johnson set spelling down with his lexicon. Even 18th century documents show a wide variation in spelling of quite common words.
In fact Americans have no difficulty at all in reading our Limey books and I hardly blench at the spelling when I read the latest Jack Reacher novel.
There are far worse crimes - look what they did to rounders, skittles and football.
Victor, thanks...BUT...point of order:
ReplyDelete"The earliest citation given in the Oxford English Dictionary for any word used as a name for this element is alumium, which British chemist and inventor Humphry Davy employed in 1808 for the metal he was trying to isolate electrolytically from the mineral alumina."
Read the rest...I know it's <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminium#Nomenclature_history>WIKI</a> but it's still true.
I think all of you concerned about "Dialogue" vs. "Dialog", "aluminum" vs. "aluminium" etc.will find that in the States they will accept either spelling. Their dictionaries will show alternative spellings and state that it is "British usage", "Australian usage" etc. The rule is that the first spelling shown will be the preferred one, but the second one will be acceptable. Thus "catalogue" will not have (most) Americans screaming "Britishism!". Of course the literacy figures there are not any better than here but there is less paranoia concerning differences in spelling being the thin end of the wedge regarding a cultural takeover.
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