From a person’s name to an action
“Fiona” sounds like the name of a person; “Kindle” is a verb, meaning to start a fire or bring something to life. That change gave the device a name that could suggest an experience rather than a character. It also made the product’s name easy to connect to reading: a book, in a sense, can kindle an idea or a story in the reader’s mind.
A name helps define a new kind of object
An e-reader sits between familiar categories. It is a piece of electronics, but people use it for the intimate, long-standing activity of reading. “Fiona” would have made the machine sound more like a distinct gadget with a personal identity. “Kindle” instead offered a metaphor that linked technology to the act of beginning something.
The switch matters because a product name can shape what people notice first. Rather than asking readers to remember a character-like label, Amazon gave its paper-book alternative a name that carried its own image: a small spark, ready to start a story.
