EDITOR’S VIEWPOINT/Dotcom name deal works for city and company
Halfway, Ore., was named for its location halfway between Robinette (under water since the construction of the Brownlee Dam in the 1950s) and Cornucopia (a gold mining boom town that no longer exists). Or it might have been named because it was halfway between the town of Pine (which still exists) and Cornucopia. Or halfway between Robinette and Pine. Indeed, Halfway is probably one of the most appropriately named towns in America, seeing as how it is halfway between nearly everything in its small corner of the map.
For the rest of 2000, however, that will no longer be true. The 345 good citizens of Halfway have decided to become the good citizens of Half.com.
It all started when a couple of guys who were putting together a dotcom company decided it would be cool to tie their business’s name (Half.com) in with a town. There being several Halfways and a good number of Half-something elses, they pretty much had their pick. But they liked the idea of Halfway, Ore., which, they saw as kind of a pioneering town that would fit nicely with their image of their company as pioneering. “I was talking to Mark Hughes from Half.com on the phone,” says City Recorder/Treasurer Diana Glynn. “I was telling him about the town. Next thing you know he says, ‘I think I’ll come meet you people in person.’ The next day, he was here. You have to understand, it’s not easy to get here. We’re remote.”
Hughes talked the Halfway city council and Mayor Dick Crow into the deal, which nets the little town $75,000 to be spent however it chooses and $5,000 to purchase an ATV to be raffled off during the Baker County Fair. Half.com, which sells books, movies and videos online, also agreed to provide links from its site to every Halfway business with a web site — and to set up web sites for those that don’t have them.
It is not unprecedented for a city to change its name. Hot Springs, N.M., switched to Truth or Consequences upon prompting from a radio station. Whereupon some embarrassed Hot Springs residents created a new town. A radio station also encouraged Ismay, Mont., to become Joe, promising to fly the entire population to St. Louis meet the former San Francisco 49ers quarterback. (Of course, only 20 people live in Joe, so the radio station didn’t take a very big hit financially. And there weren’t any street signs to change.)
Because those changes were permanent, the residents of Truth or Con-sequences and Joe are stuck with the results of their little exercise in levity. Half.com, however, only bought Half-way’s name for a year. And Halfway gets all this publicity. That’s something you can’t buy. But then, this is a rental.