I think they missed a trick really, calling the ship Boaty McBoatface would have given the opportunity to keep people engaged with the work they're doing. Think of the children's animated series, books, duvet covers, so much marketing potential while reinforcing the value of scientists (think Captain Planet for the Antarctic). Whimsy isn't necessarily inane or stupid.
I think whatever this ship ultimately ends up being called, it is going to be forever more informally referred to as Boaty McBoatface by anyone who goes near it, or to who has call to reference it.
I don't see much fun in that. The funny thing about getting the ship named Boaty McBoatface is that it would be painted on the ship and would be named as such in official documentation. The ability to casually refer to the ship by that name does exist, obviously, but how often do people refer to specific government ships by name anyway?
This will probably happen anyway. Research ships are manned by researchers (usually of the non-bureaucratic variety) and in my experience are game for a laugh. Regardless of what it gets officially named, this ship will almost certainly be unofficially referred to as Boaty McBoatface by its crew.
(And as another commenter who is familiar with the project internals pointed out - they already do call it McBoatface)
They can name it whatever they want, that ship has been recorded as "Boaty McBoatface" to my memory.
Also really kudos to them, Boaty McBoatface made everyone smile when they heard the name and got them interested; Sir David Attenborough however... doesn't make that effect.
Outside of the people who actually work on the ship, how many members of the public are ever going to have any reason to call this ship anything at all after the poll is over?
I mean, it's cute to give the public an opportunity to name something, but half the people who voted in the poll have probably forgotten the ship even exists by now.
For anyone wondering, it's an homage to the winner of a poll the Brits conducted online for deciding the name of a research vessel: http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-36064659
That doesn't have the classic "lack of gravitas" of Culture ship-naming conventions though. It reads more like a Morthanveld or Zihdren-Remnanter ship name. Unless there's a joke I'm missing in there.
Doubt it had any other meaning other than the team just having fun making a quip at the Boaty Mcboatface poll for a ship's name.
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