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Welcome To Alphanumeric Car Hell (theverge.com)
Jason H. Harper, writing for The Verge: Et tu, Hyundai? Until recently, the Korean brand offered two upmarket cars, the Genesis and the Equus. The first name had biblical shades and the latter shared a title with a play where an adolescent likes to get naked and straddle horses. So while the connotations were a bit muddled, at least they were memorable. Now Hyundai has spun Genesis into its own luxury brand, akin to what Toyota did with Lexus decades ago. And in so doing, it has cast off those memorable names in favor of an alphanumeric naming strategy. The Hyundai Genesis is reborn as the Genesis G80 and the Equus sheds its horsey homage to become the G90, which guarantees that I won't remember the new names. I'll just call the G90 the Model-Formerly-Known-as-Equus. And while the two models seemed well differentiated before, now the distinctions are hazy. The G90 apparently has 10 more units of something over the G80. Perhaps it is 10 percent better. Ten percent bigger? Ten grand more expensive? Welcome to Alphanumeric Hell.The rest of the article is worth a read as well.
"The rest of the article is worth a read as well."
Well the summary was complete shit.
No, it really isn't.
Once upon a time, Volvos had a three-digit model number: the first digit was the series, the second the number of cylinders, and the third the number of doors. So you'd know just from the model that the 245 was the lower-end four-cylinder station wagon (the "fifth door").
When they ditched that system (in the '80s?), the first model was something like the 740; their own ad poked fun at themselves, asking "No doors?"
You save only 59 seconds over 8 miles by going 75 instead of 65. Do you really have to pass that guy? Do the Math!
I liked playing the "Anal __blank__" game with car model names. Ford has some of the best "Anal Ranger", "Anal Expedition", "Anal Excursion". Plymouth has a zinger with their Prowler. Now with model names being replaced by numbers, how are we bored people supposed to laugh about car names?