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We are the only site named after the people it caters for and not the subject it is about. We also seem to lose out quite a lot on questions and contributors to English Language and Usage.

I think that if we changed our name to Learning instead of Learners, we may get more pertinent hits, more contributors, better questions and so on and so forth.

If not how about:

  • Learning English Language

What do you guys think?

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  • On the one hand, all* SE sites are about learning in some sense, so it's a little strange to call that out. On the other, it is true that focusing on basically "questions that a learner might reasonably have" is a highly subtle site focus, without anywhere near the blunt directness of "coding problems". If you can squeeze some of the subtleties of the latter into a form closer to the former I'd be down. (* All except e.g. Code Golf and Puzzling. Nobody cares about those ;))
    – Nathan Tuggy
    Commented Jan 25, 2016 at 1:18
  • Strange. IMO, that is the best thing unique about this site. And, you want to change it! :)
    – Maulik V
    Commented Jan 25, 2016 at 5:03
  • I'm not sure a miracle's gonna happen with just a name change. I would like a discussion on how to get learners to post better questions.
    – M.A.R.
    Commented Jan 25, 2016 at 12:07
  • 6
    Learners continue to join ELU in droves, and I don't think that will change, no matter what this site is named. I'm saying this tongue-in-cheek, but we should talk about changing our name only after they change theirs to something like Etymology & Single Word Requests (or maybe Etymology, Linguistics, and Unusual Words, so they can keep their "ELU" designation).
    – J.R. Mod
    Commented Jan 25, 2016 at 19:45
  • @J.R. I agree with the answer in that meta.ELU post . . . ELU's gonna keep being a big ELL until the third Google result for "ask an english question" or such similar query is the link to the "ask question" page on ELU.
    – M.A.R.
    Commented Jan 25, 2016 at 19:56
  • @J.R. How about if there was some way to leave messages on EL&U under questions saying: "We would like you to join our community here on ELL(link). We're really cool" instead of "We're closing your question please consider whether you want to buzz off and go to our learner site" ?
    – Araucaria - Not here any more.
    Commented Jan 25, 2016 at 22:39
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    +1 to Etymology, Linguistics, and Unusual Words, @J.R.!
    – Nathan Tuggy
    Commented Jan 26, 2016 at 0:47
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    @Nathan - I just noticed this question on ELU. It's less than half an hour old, yet it already has three answers (but zero comments). The user is brand new to the Stack Exchange. To be honest, ELU has devolved into just another ELL. Frankly, I'm surprised they let us graduate. But at least ELL is what it is, while a large part of ELU is what it pretends not to be.
    – J.R. Mod
    Commented Feb 1, 2016 at 16:18
  • @Araucaria - I've left that comment before, (several times, in some variation or another) – but I've grown tired of being a seemingly lone voice in the wilderness, when the rest of ELU would rather field those questions instead of using ELL.
    – J.R. Mod
    Commented Feb 1, 2016 at 16:24

2 Answers 2

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We aren't the only SE site not named exactly for its topic. I know it's one of the more obscure sites, but ahem, Stack Overflow. There's also Super User, Server Fault, Arqade, Android Enthusiasts, Database Administrators, Programmers, Writers, et. al. What evidence is there that the name is a problem?

Changing our "brand" isn't going to do anything without a corresponding campaign to re-market the site and explain why we're changing the name and drum up some business. Maybe before we make a such a big change, we should get off our butts and make some community promotion ads for EL&U (https://english.meta.stackexchange.com/a/7628/80039)

My impression is that most folks don't find us by searching for the name; they find us by searching for an answer to a question. I think that if we work on our questions so that they come up near the top of the first page of an Internet search for the same sort of question, that would have a much bigger impact than changing our name. I think our non-native speakers could really help us with this, because they will have some insight into what search terms a learner might use. Does the text of the tags on a question get indexed by search engines I wonder? That might change my opinion of whether we should keep certain tags around.

There is a lot of overlap between the EL&U and ELL communities, but from what I've seen, the EL&U folks are migrating over appropriate questions. If there is a problem that I'm not aware of, I don't think changing the name of the site is the solution we should try first.

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  • Ah, I stand corrected I hadn't seen any of the sites which are actually named after their users eg Android Enthusiasts et al.
    – Araucaria - Not here any more.
    Commented Jan 25, 2016 at 15:47
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I think the name "English Language Learners" is fine the way it is.

"Learning English Language" is worse in three ways:

  • It is not a grammatically correct phrase.
  • It needlessly changes the abbreviation of the site.
  • As a native speaker, I am here to help "English Language Learners", not to "learn [the] English language".
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  • Are you here to help people with English Language Learner? Maybe we should change the site to Native English Speakers? No, but seriously, most of the questions and users we should be getting are ending up on ELU. Why? It can't just be because that site is older, it's because the title is more apt. We don't have other SE sites named after the people we wnt to help. Good job really otherwise most of them would be called People who want to know about X
    – Araucaria - Not here any more.
    Commented Jan 25, 2016 at 2:16
  • I have to agree with you on the first two points. On the third point - I'm both a native English speaker, and an English Language Learner, so I'm here both to help and to learn.
    – ColleenV
    Commented Jan 25, 2016 at 2:38

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