Dare Obasanjo put up an excellent post on branding this morning - it should be required reading for marketing departments everywhere (from what I see in the software space, there's plenty of room for learning):

All of this is a long winded way of saying that sticking to a single brand, even if it is just the company name, gets in the way of breaking into new markets when it comes to "Web 2.0". Slapping Google or Yahoo! in front of a brand may make it more likely to be used by a certain segment of the population but it also places constraints on what can be done with those services due to people's expectations of the brand. There is a reason why Flickr eventually killed Yahoo! Photos and why it was decided that Google Video be relegated to being a search brand while YouTube would be the social sharing brand. The brand baggage and the accompanying culture made them road kill.

Don't just take that paragraph - go read the whole thing. You'll be glad you did.

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