4 ms·

Funny, I would have picked the "Baking for Dummies" book. Perhaps it's because I am a novice at cooking and don't necessarily want the best book on baking at th

Funny, I would have picked the "Baking for Dummies" book. Perhaps it's because I am a novice at cooking and don't necessarily want the best book on baking at the moment, just an introductory one; and I can be pretty sure the Dummies book will be decent since it is part of a well-known series. Likewise with these StackExchange sites; some of them I had no idea they were stackexchange sites until I actually visited them. It took quite a while to click on their links after seeing them around the net in some cases. Had it been superuser.stackexchange.com I would have immediately known it would probably be a high-caliber Q&A site. I guess I'm an outlier on both points?

robryan 16y ago
It works both ways I guess, I generally avoid the for Dummies series I think mainly because I've gone through a few a long time ago and didn't find them to useful. So yes, the brand can carry over, but also in a negative as well as a positive way. Although with stack exchange it doesn't matter to much, because the sites all have the same look. So that works the same way the domain name would.
JadeNB 16y ago
I think the general premise that ‘series are bad’ is flawed. When I am looking for programming books, I look for O'Reilly (maybe that doesn't count as a series, in the sense that one can refer to “O'Reilly volume 47” or whatever, but neither can one do that with a “for Dummies” book); when I am looking for math books, I look for Springer Lecture Notes, London Math Notes, or any of a number of other series. (In fact, I was just marvelling the other day at the universality of the Springer brand—even in domains about which I don't know anything, when I see that logo, I immediately think that I'm seeing a book that's worth reading.)
- hartror 16y ago
  Brands are aimed at demographics, which is why Unilever has the Dove brand and the Lynx brand for basically the same product for example. People identify with a brand, have a perception and make purchasing decisions based on it. What Joel's point is, I believe, is that generic umbrella series/brands are bad for user/customer perception (such as his "For Dummies" example). And as the entire Stack Exchange ecosystem is going to cover a massive range of topics it makes more sense to separate them as the good perception of a Stack Exchange cooking site isn't going to help the perception of a Stack Exchange mechanics site.
  - fragmede 16y ago
    I can kinda see Joel's point, but it runs counter to the whole notion of branding. Cooking may seem to have little to do with mechanics, but a QA website about cooking vs. a QA website about mechanics has, well, the QA website part in common. That's not to say I'd put up with crap on a mechanic's QA site even if the cooking QA site was good, but previous experience with Google search absolutely helped sell the Gmail switch.
  - JadeNB 16y ago
    > What Joel's point is, I believe, is that generic umbrella series/brands are bad for user/customer perception (such as his "For Dummies" example). I'm not saying that there is no such thing as a bad umbrella brand, just that there is such a thing as a good umbrella brand (at least for me). Springer (which also covers a massive range of topics!), and possibly also O'Reilly, are examples of umbrella brands that I perceive as good. In fact, I can think of far more good umbrella brands than bad ones for books; as a bibliophile, I rely on my knowledge that I can trust certain publishers for quality, format, content, &c. to help me make my buying decisions quickly. I can't think of many examples of good or bad brands for websites—except CPAN and its derivatives, which are (again, to me) a very good umbrella brand indeed. (I can think of CTAN and JSAN right off the top of my head; I'm sure that there are others.)

robryan 16y ago

It works both ways I guess, I generally avoid the for Dummies series I think mainly because I've gone through a few a long time ago and didn't find them to useful. So yes, the brand can carry over, but also in a negative as well as a positive way. Although with stack exchange it doesn't matter to much, because the sites all have the same look. So that works the same way the domain name would.

JadeNB 16y ago

I think the general premise that ‘series are bad’ is flawed. When I am looking for programming books, I look for O'Reilly (maybe that doesn't count as a series, in the sense that one can refer to “O'Reilly volume 47” or whatever, but neither can one do that with a “for Dummies” book); when I am looking for math books, I look for Springer Lecture Notes, London Math Notes, or any of a number of other series. (In fact, I was just marvelling the other day at the universality of the Springer brand—even in domains about which I don't know anything, when I see that logo, I immediately think that I'm seeing a book that's worth reading.)

hartror 16y ago
Brands are aimed at demographics, which is why Unilever has the Dove brand and the Lynx brand for basically the same product for example. People identify with a brand, have a perception and make purchasing decisions based on it. What Joel's point is, I believe, is that generic umbrella series/brands are bad for user/customer perception (such as his "For Dummies" example). And as the entire Stack Exchange ecosystem is going to cover a massive range of topics it makes more sense to separate them as the good perception of a Stack Exchange cooking site isn't going to help the perception of a Stack Exchange mechanics site.
- fragmede 16y ago
  I can kinda see Joel's point, but it runs counter to the whole notion of branding. Cooking may seem to have little to do with mechanics, but a QA website about cooking vs. a QA website about mechanics has, well, the QA website part in common. That's not to say I'd put up with crap on a mechanic's QA site even if the cooking QA site was good, but previous experience with Google search absolutely helped sell the Gmail switch.
- JadeNB 16y ago
  > What Joel's point is, I believe, is that generic umbrella series/brands are bad for user/customer perception (such as his "For Dummies" example). I'm not saying that there is no such thing as a bad umbrella brand, just that there is such a thing as a good umbrella brand (at least for me). Springer (which also covers a massive range of topics!), and possibly also O'Reilly, are examples of umbrella brands that I perceive as good. In fact, I can think of far more good umbrella brands than bad ones for books; as a bibliophile, I rely on my knowledge that I can trust certain publishers for quality, format, content, &c. to help me make my buying decisions quickly. I can't think of many examples of good or bad brands for websites—except CPAN and its derivatives, which are (again, to me) a very good umbrella brand indeed. (I can think of CTAN and JSAN right off the top of my head; I'm sure that there are others.)