Cartogrammar is stupid

Three or four years in, I’m sick of that “Cartogrammar” name. I’m abandoning it and using my own name instead: andywoodruff.com.

Back in 2007, or maybe 2008, I agonized over choosing a domain name. Those were wild days, a time when we all had to try to compete with the more badass names of our friends’ websites (e.g., or really i.e., indiemaps). Eventually I settled on Cartogrammar for its mild wordplay. It was about the grammar of cartography or some such nonsense. It never was a cool name and I never did invent a meaning for it, but even worse is that it sounds like it has to do with cartograms, which I kind of hate. And why try to give myself branding, anyway? I’m already part of a company that has a name. Using my own name for a domain name seemed dull a few years ago, but now dot-comming myself just seems to make sense.

No bookmarks or anything are dying here. The new domain simply points to the same place as cartogrammar.com, so everything continues to work as usual. Just wanted to note that I’m dropping the Cartogrammar name from the site and that from now on I prefer to link to andywoodruff.com instead. (While I was at these changes, by the way, I made some updates to my portfolio page.)

See you in hell, Cartogrammar!

4 Comments

  1. ahhhh much better…now the proverbial Oz is out from behind the curtain. Self-branding your web site with your name… You should read (if you haven’t already) the very enjoyable “Jennifer Government” by Max Barry.

    Lou
    1 November 2011 @ 10:22pm

  2. For what it’s worth, Google Reader presented me with a list of feeds I might my like. I clicked ‘Cartogrammer’ first because the name sounded interesting.

    Anyway, Google was right; nice site you have here.

    wherebear
    14 November 2011 @ 3:53pm

  3. man, cartogrammar is the name i cite when i want to make my friends laugh at me as a geek, that was a GREAT name! byebye from your fanboy in italy

    onq
    30 November 2011 @ 7:54am

  4. I’d hate to stifle ridicule of geeks! Well, the old name and URL are still valid, at least, if it’s preferred to remain the geek instead of going to just some dude’s blog!

    Andy Woodruff
    30 November 2011 @ 9:12am