1.5) How did Atari get it's name?

Graham Thornton, mailto:dangermouse@prodigy.nospam.net types:

This article was published in "I/O - The Magazine of the Atari Home
Computer Club" in issue 3 - Summer 1983.  The magazine was the official
mouthpiece of Atari UK. The article was not attributed to any one person.
The words are thiers, not mine.

How Atari Got It's Name
-----------------------

The name Atari actually comes from Japan.  And yet the company is most
definitely American.  Every wondered why?  It's an interesting story and
one well worth telling.

In 1972 three friends decided to invent and market the first commercially
feasible video game.  They were Nolan Bushnell, Ted Dabney and Larry Bryan.

To become a partner each man had to submit $100 to the project - a
remarkably small sum when you consider the company's success!  The next
step was to find a name.

Drinking beer and thumbing through the dictionary one day, the three
friends came across an interesting entry under "S".  The word was Syzygy,
or "the straight-line configuration between three celestial bodies".  What
a perfect name they thought, for three such astronomically talented people!

Now they could get on with the business of inventing games.  Their first,
Computer Space, was produced and all seemed to be going well.

But then things started to get a little shaky.  Larry Bryan decided not to
ante up his $100 and pulled out, leaving Bushnell and Dabney to go it
alone.

The set up a shop in Santa Clara, California, and incorporated the
business.  A little later they invented Pong(r).

Busnell and Dabney applied for the name Syzygy to the Office of the
California Secretary of State, which regulates Californian corporations,
but were told that they were too late.  The name was already taken.

Following unsuccessful attempts to buy the rights to the name from the
first Syzygy corporation, which appeared to be inactive, the friends'
solicitor pressed them to think up an alternative.

This proved difficult.  BD Inc and DB Inc were tested and then rejected in
turn:  the first bore too close a resemblance to Black & Decker, the second
to Dunn and Bradstreet.

Inspiration occurred at last, once again in an informal atmosphere.
Bushnell and Dabney were both keen players of Go, a Japanese strategy game,
and their best brainstorming always occurred over a good game and a bottle
of beer.

This time, they decided to make a list of several Go words to see if one of
them would fly as the new corporate name.

First choice was "Sente", which means "the upper hand" - something that
greatly appealed.  Second and third choices were "Atari", which has a
similar meaning to the English word "check", and "Hanne", an
acknowledgement of an over-taking move.

Busnell and Dabney submitted the list once again to the Office of the
Californian Secretary of State, which approved "Atari".  The rest is
history.

When the company name changed, Bushnell and Dabney decided to update the
logo too.  They incorporated the "S" from Syzygy and the "A" from Atari
into the new design, and if you look at the middle logo [MLOGO2.BMP], you
will be able to make out both letters.

It was not until later, as the company became increasingly successful, that
an advertising agency designed the slicker and now famous Atari logo - the
"fuji" or stylised "A" design.