The Immanuel Name Domain

Companies and products are jostling to find domain names for Internet markets. But the space is crowded and hotly contested. So what’s in a name? A lot. That’s what the prophet says to King Ahaz, who apparently doesn’t have a clue.

[NOTE: In the print version, the actual Chinese characters appear here. To find these characters to copy, paste, and project, simply type in Xingbake as a keyword, and you will find some sites where the characters will show up.]

That’s Xingbake for non—Chinese speakers.

It’s a compound word in which “xing” means “star” and “bake” (pronounced bah—kuh) means “bucks.”

So there you have it: Starbucks.

And the Seattle—based coffee company, which has 37 stores in Shanghai and almost 100 in China, is not too happy about it. A Shanghai company is peddling coffee in a land known more for its tea, and it’s doing so using the name Xingbake which Starbucks alleges is an infringement on its trademark.

Mao Yubo, the owner of the company that owns the chain of stores — a chain that consists of two stores — says that its company registered the name in China before Starbucks even applied. And in China, anyone with the name Mao is probably someone you’d better listen to.

What’s in a name?

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