Rebranding

The rebranding initiative is now finalized. The workgroup has decided to keep the name as the Direct Project.

Rebranding

As circumstances have it, we can no longer use the short form of "the Nationwide Health Information Network"; for now we've renamed everything to "Direct Project". While HHS figures out a different name for the overall effort, there's no reason not to give this effort a more specific, interesting name, to apply to everything we do and create within the bounds of this effort. In keeping with the spirit of this project, we'd like to see the community come up with a couple of options.

Suggestions for good names: (feel free to add more)

• Should be related thematically to health care.
• Should try to connote directed messaging or a direct connection.
• Should include the word "Project", or something similar, to denote a community effort that creates something useful.
• Should not be too specific to or offensive to a particular race, ethnicity, or cultural group.
• Should have little prior meaning - a Google search for that term should not turn up too many similar efforts or resources.

Please add suggestions below, or enhance the "Pro" and "Con" sections of existing suggestions. Suggestions and comments are open through Friday, October 1st, then we'll decide. The first one is just an example, don't take it too seriously.

Suggested New Project Name	Pro	Con	Possible / Available hostname
Project Pigeon	Connotes directed messaging. Humorous, and obliquely references RFC 1149. Opens the door to entertaining and distinctive logos or imagery.	Hard to say with a straight face. Not all that related to health care. Also, a prior use as found on the Wikipedia sounds like something from Dr. Strangelove.
MUDEX - Meaningful Use Direct Exchange	1. Pronounceable - M'you - Dex 2. Two syllables - with same cadence as NHIN 3. mudex.org domain available 4. Mudex is not found in US Patent and Trademark simple word search 5. Minimal Google Hits 6. Similar to MUX/DEMUX electrical components with similar functioning 7. Short and sweet 8. Cool and Catchy Acronym 9. Title characterizes Direct mission statement 10. Not a real word but word like 11. Good name for a protocol	1. Might be pronounced Mud Ex 2. Limits unnecessarily to Meaningful Use	mudex.org
Direct Secure Health Information Exchange Project	(DSHIE Project) -- acronym is pronounceable as "dishy". Really says what it's about. Ties in with HIT PC Privacy policies about "directed exchange." A Google search for the full name primarily comes back to NHIN Direct related pages, certainly not any other major topic. A search for the acronym primarily hits Facebook or MySpace member handles. Reasonable memorable but not "cute."	Some might argue that the name is too close to "HIE". Others may not. Not humorous.
Direct Project	Domain available (reserved). Short & sweet. Easy to understand connection from NHIN Direct. Continuity with current arbitrarily chosen brand name.	No "sizzle". Not health related. Prior use. Possibly poor SEO.	directproject.org
Direct Information Exchange	Says exactly what it is	DIE may not be the best acronym
HealthIDirect or HealthEDirect or HealthIEDirect	All pronounced "Healthy Direct" Neither spelling appears to be taken (based on a quick Google search). Keeps the "health" aspect that we lost when NHIN vanished. The middle "I" could stand for Information. If middle "E" it could be as in "e-health" Middle IE would obviously mean Information Exchange.	HealthDirect.com (without the middle initials) is a website name Embedded IED has negative connotations
Directed Information Document Nationwide Technology	good acronym	bad acronym
Simple E-mail eXchange	SEX - Really!	SEX - Really? Also too limited to e-mail
Nationwide Directed Simple Document Exchange		Maybe too limiting -- not all messages are "documents"
Simple Exchange of Documents
Exchange Directed Documents
Cross Nation Directed Documents
Directed Nationwide Health Documents
Directed Medical Information Exchange		"Medical" is too limiting
Nationwide Directed Exchange of Medical Documents
Health Internet Direct	Already being called that in some quarters... Goes nicely with Health Internet Service Provider (HISP)...	But does not go nicely with Health Information Service Provider (HISP)
Directed Exchange	Acronym of DirEx sounds all techy and cool	Said acronym is also homonymic with a brand of prophylactic. This may not be a con, depending on your sense of humor. Pronounced the same as DirX which is an LDAP product name (from Siemens)
HIE Direct Connect		Might get confused with the CONNECT project. HIE is evocative of a centralized repository for many
Directed Health Information Network	DHIN is not too far from NHIN. No prior use, it seems.	[1] - Delaware Health Information Network
Universal Health Messaging Project	Speaks to the universal addressing and nature of the project.
Health-E-Mail Project	Might help explain what this is to consumers - that this is mostly about secure email for health care purposes.	But limits it unnecessarily to e-mail
Directed Health eXchange	DHeX or DHEX. Pronounced "dex." Easy to say (none of this "N-Hin vs Nin?" stuff), don't think it's already taken, and includes the main "direct" and "Health" concepts that Janet doesn't want to lose.
InterHealthNet Direct Connect Exchange	Places "health" in the word internet, right in the middle where it belongs. We might have InterHealthNET Direct, InterhealthNET Connect, InterHealthNET Exchange
NHEN (National Health Exchange Network)	Maintains a similar pronunciation to the familiar NHIN (I've heard it pronounced both EN-Hin and NEE-Hin) Our project can be called NHEN-Direct	missed opportunity to create new, distictive brand	NHEN.com
HEA (Healthcare Exchange Address)	Referring to it as an "address" implies an underlying network or registry of users Similar to DEA number -- something every physician has	may feel generic, but that could also be a positive	HEA.com
SPEN (Secure Provider Exchange Network)	Upfront reassurance about the security of information sharing Also SPEN-Direct	Health would have to be implied since it's not specifically called out. SPEN-D probably not a desirable acronym.	SPEN.com
NPID (National Provider Identifier Directory)	Leverages the National Provider Identifier (NPI) standard from CMS Every covered health care provider has one of these identifying numbers -- can we use this directory to assign email addresses to automatically build the master network?
enHIN Direct (enabling the Health Information Network)	We can continue to say the same thing we already say: “enhin” or “enhin direct”.
Health Direct	Meets Janet's criteria.	Premium (one-time) domain address. But can use directproject.org, and call it Health Direct
NW-HIN Direct (Nationwide Health Information Network Direct)	NHIN will likely become NW-HIN - pronounce N-Win :-)