Your absolutely, right I completely misread that.
Fact is if you didn't have a name you would just be another human. And the only way to distinguish you would be by your characteristics. Slightly narcistic. Same with corals. You could describe a purple hornet as a zoanthid with a purple center yellow ring an alternating purple and yellow skirt. It's much easier to call it a purple hornet. And when selling corals it's not the name that causes hype its the demand for the coral and lack of supply that does. The name just makes it easier for those of us in the hobby to obtain the coral we are after. Adding a nick name does not add value or hype, it takes away confusion when trying to obtain a coral.
And it sounded like you said even though his wasn't ugly, they only name the ugly and common zoa's and give them ridiculous names.
I do see your point to an extent. I really do and there was a time I agreed with you. However it's completely ridiculous to make the analogy of a zoanthid to a human. How can you say it's *narcissistic to describe and judge a coral by it's looks? How else would you judge it? You can't say a name does anything for you either. It's not what actually distinguishes you. (Although if your name was Vlad the Impaler, I must admit, I'd have a decent amount of respect from you just for the name. :beer

I do think names are somewhat helpful, but I think overall, they hurt us, as hobbyists. How can you not see that at least the origin of naming certain corals was to make money? A purple people eater, one of first zoos named, went for a lot of money. Then they came out with the red people eater, and hell, now every single palythoa is called a people eater, pretty much.
I'm all for names, and even lineage, as long as they are accurate and there is some way to track them. From the ones I know, I would say sweetd's colony is closest to eye of rah. However, if I were to have one image of eye of rah in my head, and ordered these from him, I may not be too happy when I get them. The fact is, there are many different morphs of just about any name. I know someone who found a wild colony of "purple hornets" and bought hundreds of polyps for next to nothing. Then when he was selling them to people for $50 a polyp (a steal at the time), people got really upset when they got them and they didn't look like the real thing. I bought a sunset monti on here from someone and they dropped it off for me. I asked for a picture and they sent me to some online site selling a tyree sunset. I asked if it was a tyree and was pretty much scolded by numerous people for caring about the lineage. In fact, I don't care about the lineage. I just wanted to know what the piece looked like. I'm not going to buy something because it has lineage, i'm going to buy it if I like it. However, if I'm going to pay a lineage price, I would at least like it to be there, cause I know some people do care. But anyways, as soon as I got the coral, assured time and time again that it was a sunset, upon first glance I could clearly see it was a browned out rainbow monti...
That's why I like going to LFSs instead of buying online. Even to LFSs besides the one I work at. Sure, I can order a pink milli and get it at a much cheaper price through the store I work at than at some other store, but if I like that particular one, why would I settle for something else?
This is part of the reason I have my signature. You wouldn't believe how many times I've seen someone selling whatever coral and when they post a picture of it, it's just brown. Whether that be because it just isn't too colorful or because their tank cant support the color is irrelevant. If I order something as a purple monti cap, I want it to be purple as all hell if there's no picture. The names are just a way people get around giving a picture.
Fishkid, a friend of mine, was selling a latz clown on here the other week and wanted something like 300-350 for it, which is expensive as hell, but not a bad price. When asked for a picture, he said he thinks they all look pretty much the same. That could be true to an extent. But you wouldn't believe how many clownfish I've seen in my life. Especially coming out of a stranger's tank, there are some ugly clownfish (once again, often due to husbandry). If I were to spend that much on something, I'd want to see a picture instead of just having a name. (not meaning to call you out, of course Matt. I know she must have been beautiful. I'm just saying I understand the person's view who wanted to see a picture

)
Names, if general, do not take away from confusion. They can create more confusion that a picture would solve.
And no... I never said the coral was ugly... I just said you see more ridiculous names with some of the more common corals, because people try to make them seem nicer than they are. Please read my post for a third time.
Also, can I just say that purple hornets aren't all that great? Anyone else agree with me? Sure they're pretty cool, but not worth the price they were once fetching.
Sorry for the essay.
And extra sorry to sweet d. :spin2: