Well it's good to know they have an underlying structure to *something*.

This is cool. One of things I often wondered about but never looked up. Thanks, Miko.

Some of the examples aren't that great...

Bookcase ranges: Occupations
BILLY (a Swedish masculine name) is a popular shelf

Not even close, right? Men's names are supposed to be for chairs and desks.

Kitchens: grammatical terms, sometimes also other names
DINERA (meaning: (to) dine) for tableware
SKÄRPT (meaning: sharp or clever) is a line of kitchen knives

I'm not entirely sure what a "grammatical term" is, but I imagine an English example would be "adjective" or "pronoun." I guess the two examples fit into "also other names," but that's kinda lame.

I don't know much about it, but I've heard that the naming system for pharmaceuticals is very strange. The brand names are marketing-derived, but the non-proprietary names of the drugs are somewhat "made up" too. My understanding is that there's an attempt to incorporate prefixes and suffixes that relate to chemical compounds, but that sometimes things are just kinda improvised for the sake of convenience. I would've thought there would be a more strict structure in place similar to the system for naming plants and animals.

That would make sense, mullacc, since there are often problems with similar-sounding but very different drugs. I read a New Yorker piece about drug naming not long ago, and it did seem profoundly irrational.

I went straight to Billy too. I had one for years and we were on a first name basis. I wonder how he slipped into the occupations category. I'd like to be a billy when I grow up. What are the hours?
(BTW, this is my first metachat post.)

My best textbook in nursing school was the pharmacology one. The author was very direct and clear. He was also on a major hobby horse about drug names. It had never occurred to me how crazy it is that drugs even have brand names. It's not like Green Giant Peas are named Greas or something. Why can't we just have the company name and then the generic name? The current system leads to major confusion and therefor safety problems. Grar.

You will never get Sven, my breadknife away from me!

BlueJayWay, could you come to my house and hold up my books?

Welcome, BlueJayWay! I love that song.

Billy's maybe an outlier.

I lean toward the Wikipedia list being more crowdsourced than anything else. Also, just because there's a scheme, doesn't mean the scheme has been set in concrete, or that pre-existing product lines will fit.

Scheme is the name of wooden spoon I got at Ikea.

Huh, there is an Ektorp south east of Stolkholm (I have the couch and two chairs). Billy has been around a long time, maybe it was named before the naming structure was solidified?