Faith
Just when I was losing faith in my fellow citizens along comes this...
What to call a £200m 15,000-tonne polar vessel – how about Boaty McBoatface?
The good folk of Blighty have voted with their fingers - the polar-bound Royal Research Ship is to be called Boaty McBoatface. The Natural Environmental Research Council last week asked for suggestions to name the £200m, 15,000 tonne floating lab that is bound for colder climes once it launches in 2019. At last count, some …
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Monday 21st March 2016 17:15 GMT Anonymous Coward
This is why everyone thinks students are w*****s
Is it just me or does "Boaty McBoatface" utterly smack of a bunch of first year uni students with a hilarious sense of humour and too much time on their hands trying to skew the vote?
When they're factored out, it'll turn out that your fellow citizens actually voted for something boringly worthy like "Vanguard". :-)
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Monday 21st March 2016 18:28 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: This is why everyone thinks students are w*****s
Like the proud wankers who voted for Fapulous Apple to be the new Mountain Dew flavor, only to be outvoted by Hitler Did Nothing Wrong, brought to you by 4chan IIRC.
This is what always happens when you ask the internet. And you fully deserve it if you're too chicken to come up with a name yourselves.
P.S. c'mon guys, there's still time to do worse than Boaty McBoatface.
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Tuesday 22nd March 2016 10:33 GMT Triggerfish
Re: This is why everyone thinks students are w*****s
So how do you know students did it, or do you work your conclusions backwards from bias?
Also the website crashed after news reports of the name as far as I know, could still be people cheating the system but I like to hope the whole of the UK heard the story and wen't yeah lets make sure that name wins.
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Tuesday 22nd March 2016 12:32 GMT Alien8n
Re: This is why everyone thinks students are w*****s
It's this kind of logic that helps Finnish death metal bands win the Eurovision.
Let's face it, when Lordi were announced as Finland's entry that year they were guaranteed 12 points from the UK :)
And we clearly don't want to win, otherwise we'd just get Iron Maiden to enter...
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Tuesday 22nd March 2016 15:24 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: This is why everyone thinks students are w*****s
@ Triggerfish; "So how do you know students did it, or do you work your conclusions backwards from bias?"
Given that I said it "utterly smacked" of a bunch of students, I think it's quite obvious that my conclusion was 100% worked backwards from narrowminded, student-stereotyping bias.
Duh!
You make it sound like that's a bad thing! ;-)
@DaLo; "Well seeing as that suggestion was from the Communications Manager of The Independent Association of Prep Schools, James Hand, then does that add or detract weight from your theory?"
"Independent Association of Prep Schools"? You mean this guy's got enough free time from his "real" job (i.e. doing PR for future Bullingdon Club members training to get into Eton) to come up with this?
You're probably right. Not so much a student w*****r, more of a "****** Mc****face" then?
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Wednesday 23rd March 2016 15:51 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: This is why everyone thinks students are w*****s @AC
@Triggerfish; Either that or I was playing up the (admittedly not entirely without foundation) stereotype of students and young people in general- yes, I've been there myself, surprisingly- and quite obviously acknowledging that for tongue-in-cheek purposes.
I guess if you missed that glaringly obvious fact you might think I was a Daily Mail reader rather than someone who wouldn't wipe my arse with it for fear of turning my backside racist. (Joke stolen from some comedian, can't remember who...)
What are "predujices" by the way? Are they a range of delicious orange and apple flavoured drinks popular with the aforementioned Daily Mail set? (^_^)
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Monday 21st March 2016 15:51 GMT Clockworkseer
Reminds me of the Gitwizard/David Blaine and his attempt to hang in a glass box over the Thames with no food. At which point the british public obligingly used remote control aircraft to drop cheeseburgers on the roof.
If there's a way to skewer excess dignity, the british public will find it.
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Monday 21st March 2016 20:36 GMT akeane
Moc moc!
PiiinnnnnnGGGUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!
Hopefully the boat will be sufficiently armed to take out that boring Sammy the Seal who is always messing up Pingu's fun...
P.S. I am not mad, and have only had my allowed daily ration of cognac. Peace to you all (expect boring seals)
Hail Pingu, fools!
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Monday 21st March 2016 15:54 GMT the spectacularly refined chap
This is nothing new
People should have learned by now you can't trust the public to name things. It's probably 150 years since the East Lancashire Railway ran a public poll to name a club they were opening for use by their employees. The winner: The East Lancashire Railway Employee's Club.
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Tuesday 22nd March 2016 14:11 GMT Triggerfish
Re: This is nothing new
The town of Ugly's Womens Institute was named the Ugly Womens Institute, bit of a problem, to alleviate this it was changed to - The Womens Institute - Ugly Branch.
Also shout out to the town of Muff in Ireland and their scuba club, I'll leave you all to guess the name.
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Monday 21st March 2016 16:10 GMT Bob Rocket
merchandising pays expenses
Calling their new ship RSS Boaty McBoatface could spawn huge merchandising opportunities including plastic toys, tv cartoons (think Bob the Builder), get Aardman to do a feature, this could be worth millions.
It would also publicise the science and attract young minds into the field.
Of course that won't happen, they will name the ship after some worthy dead bloke that no one has heard of (much less has any interest in) and the opportunity will be lost.
TPTB have no idea how the modern world works.
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Monday 21st March 2016 17:52 GMT Anonymous Cowherder
What a load of joyless c***s.
Boaty McBoatface is a perfectly cromulent name. The narks rolling back from letting the people name the bloody thing preferring a "Panel of experts" do it instead is a nonsense. How does one become a boatnaming expert? I've named dogs, cats, rabbits, teams at work, cars and other inanimate objects as well as fantasy football teams, servers, networks, AD domains and all manner of other things, does this make me an expert?
You've opened the poll, live by the winning entry, who cares what the bloody thing is actually called? Vote freedom, vote McBoatface!
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Monday 21st March 2016 18:21 GMT x 7
damn page is still u/s, otherwise I would have suggested naming the ship "RRS William Dampier" after one of our greatest, earliest maritime explorers. First man to circumnavigate the world three times, the first by accident.
He instigated the study of ocean currents, and some of his charts are still in use. He predates Cook by around 100 years
He marooned William Selkirk, and then navigated the ship that picked him up again years later. First man to properly chart any part of Australia
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Tuesday 22nd March 2016 23:34 GMT Skribblez
Not so awkward a conversation for Selkirk?
Been awhile since I did any research into the background of Defoe's _Crusoe_ but didn't Selkirk ask to be marooned after arguing over the seaworthiness of the ship he was on, which sank shortly thereafter?
Dampier commanded the other ship and the overall expedition, so the conversation would have been more, "I told them so!" than awkward.
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Monday 21st March 2016 18:45 GMT Cynic_999
Thinking of yachts I've come across, the two best names were:
A rather uncomfortable & lively hard-chine sailboat called, "Bucking Float" and a large concrete yacht christened, "Maid of Portland".
For this vessel though, I refer to another El Reg article and suggest "RRS Large Ships and How to Avoid Them"
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Tuesday 22nd March 2016 04:49 GMT ShadowDragon8685
One of my friends - an unironically german friend - had to say about this: "Apparently, Britain as a whole is stupid. The Queen Herself will have to name it the way it's chosen. IMAGINE her saying:"I dub thee RRS Boaty McBoatface / RRS Big Shipinnit!""
After I objected that that sounded (a) hilarious and (b) HILARIOUS, he then mentioned that magical word: "Ships, especially official ones, not privately owned ones and even more so that make your head of state look like an idiot for naming it otherwise should come with names with a certain amount of gravitas..."
Which of course, makes me want to suggest they name the sodding thing RRS Quantum of Gravitas, although I personally prefer RRS Big Shipinnit.
Not that I'm eligible to have a say in the matter, since my ancestors went and told HM the King to go and bugger all of Parliament (and vice-versa) ~240 years ago. But still, if you're gonna hold a vote, you should either say without hesitation "Yes, we'll use the winner," or set guidelines that will obviously disqualify certain entries - such as "the ship must be named after a groundbreaking naval explorer," or "the ship must be named after a citizen of the UK with some connection to the sciences and to the antarctic" or at least "suggestions must have at least a moderate amount of gravitas to be considered."
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Tuesday 22nd March 2016 10:14 GMT David Roberts
Endless scope for fun
I was kind of hoping it would be named the Black Pig. For endless crew name puns.
However I would go with the leading suggestion if they recruited a Mr. Skipper to be the commanding officer.
Skipper Skipper of Boaty McBoatface has an undeniable ring to it.
[Or even Skipper McSkipper.]
Biting the hand that feeds IT
