What’s in a name?

I usually get one of two looks when I announce the name of my company as “Nifty Digits”. Either a “Ah, I like that” or a raised eyebrow. Generally, it’s the person latter in years who might raise an eyebrow.

When I picked the name, I was still a PhD student at University and wanted something that “sounded technical (digits), but also sort of British (nifty)”. I also was heavily influenced number of web design bloggers at the time, particularly Dan Cedarholm’s blog “Simple Bits”. I really liked the juxtaposition of simplicity and technical that name seemed to convey.

The other thing I liked was that it seemed it could be interpreted a number of different ways, lending itself to allowing me to be very versatile in terms of what I chose to work on. (I guess this is why I get the occasional raised eyebrow). This has allowed me to work on my own Fairtrade tshirt offshoot, tv/feature film pipelines and more traditional agile based software development.

Choosing a company name that wasn’t my own surname was deliberate - I’d seen various companies titled around a particular individual and that didn’t gel well with me. I would love my own little company to eventually become big enough to employ others, but naming it after myself seemed overly self-confident.

I didn’t register the company at first - just a domain, subsequently establishing it once finishing my job at Aardman animations.

I’ve now been working as Nifty Digits Ltd for over 6 years, which seems crazy and I hope to continue working as it for many more.