Well, if I'd been considering a rethink on my plan not to patronize the Rendo Marketplace (after the deleted contest post fiasco) this sure would finish it.

Ynsaen is a bit hot under the collar, but makes some quite reasonable points in there. Chief among these are that it's not so much the name - I've passed by it, rolled my eyes, and moved on - but in how concerns are treated. They are typified by this statement:

If we had found this to be offensive to more than a few competing merchants, or any complaints from members, we would have taken action to have the name changed. This was simply not the case.

Now, I went back and read the thread that started all this, and noted that none of the merchants who complained could be said to be "competing" with the product. This means, to my mind, that the writer was creating an impression that this was a malicious attempt to undercut another merchant, when that was not in fact the case, and wrongs the legitimate concerns of those who complained. (The deletions and forum-lockout also make the impression of a "sweep it under the rug" attitude much stronger.)

That's what I, personally, find offensive. I mean, if I were to slyly insinuate, "Well, those cases of mammary hypertrophy are best-sellers, and of course Renderosity doesn't want to listen to concerns that affect their bottom line..." I imagine Rendo staff would find that quite offensive. Why, then, would they use a similarly slanderous approach to people who are concerned that a certain name objectifies women to an unacceptable extent? "Competing," indeed... pfft.

A suggestion for an alternate approach:

"We understand that some have expressed concern over the use of certain names as possibly demeaning to women. We do take these concerns seriously, as we do not want anyone to feel insulted by the products we offer. However, this puts us in a difficult situation - if we react too strongly to any name someone considers offensive, we will be accused of censorship. It is a fine line to walk, and we're treading it as best as we can.

"The merchant knows of your concerns and is considering a name change. Until he informs us of his final decision, we ask you to be patient. A voluntary change on the part of the merchant would be the simplest solution from our point of view. However, if the merchant is not amenable to the changes, we will have to revisit this issue; it may be a matter where we feel we cannot dictate to the individual merchants. We will have to weigh the number offended by the term against the number offended by "censorship", and arrive at our best decision. We welcome further input on both sides of the issue, but request in the strongest terms that members be respectful of each other and the staff during the discussions, and patient on the issue of the merchant's individual (and doubtless difficult) decision."

Careful wording, in my experience, can take one a long, long way toward avoiding blow-ups such as these.