No, Illyrian, Naqaỹa, Mastika, Automex aren't Hollywood's hottest baby names – they're new monikers for exoplanets

On Tuesday the International Astronomical Union announced the names of 112 exoplanets and their parent stars, with names selected from 112 different countries here on Earth. Officials selected the names from 360,000 submissions from space enthusiasts as part of its IAU100 NameExoWorlds campaign to celebrate the IAU’s 100th …

[Belperite]

Disappointed that Ilus wasn't chosen. Was it the slugs?

[Steve Graham]

terminological inexactitude

Call me a nerd, but I have to point out that the UK names come from the Isle of Man, which isn't part of the UK.

[alferdpacker]

Re: terminological inexactitude

I would call you a nerd but... https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/12/18/nerds_hate_speech/

[Amentheist]

Mastika

Aniseed flavour spirit, interesting choice, Is it also because the object named after it becomes cloudy when ice is dipped into it. Icon because imagine the same but 5 times as strong.

[CAPS LOCK]

Not...

...LV426 from anywhere then? I am disappoint. Not even Tatooine.

[Chris G]

Think of the authors

The authors of a century or more of sci-fi have come up with hundreds or thousands of names for planets, their work in many ways has inspired us to look outwards to see what we can discover. I would have thought it would be a nice nod to their contributions to name some planets from what must be a long list of planet names.

Maybe I should do a Kickstarter to fund my reading of the whole of science fiction in order to catalogue all of the planetary names.

[Twanky]

Re: Think of the authors

Yeah, but no, but... When can we name somewhere WeMadeIt?

[Vector]

No, Illyrian, Naqaỹa, Mastika, Automex aren't Hollywood's hottest baby names...

That'll be next year.

[I3N]

It's Laika, not Pluto

Still lobbying for the change ... and know who to address ...