For the longest time, I’ve had the alias sudorandom. At this point, it feels like just another name. So why did I rebrand this website from sudorandom.dev to kmcd.dev? Let’s dig into it.

I am me

My name is Kevin McDonald. The name isn’t going away any time soon, so it simply makes sense to use my name in my personal branding online. And while I think sudorandom is a brilliant pun, I don’t want to immediately drive away those who don’t immediately understand the pun or, worse, think that I just can’t spell ‘pseudorandom’.

I am not currently looking to reach a broader audience, but I think it’s useful to have a branding that isn’t appealing to only a small subset of people. kmcd.dev, since it’s a shortening of my name, transcends any niche linux/computer science reference.

professionalism

I still want to keep a casual tone to the website for now, but I think my website fails the simple test of being able to verbally explain the name of your website without having to awkwardly guess how proficient in the tech world the other person is. I think kmcd.dev easily passes this test and is frankly very nice to type. I’ve typed it a few times already in this post and it just feels snappy.

You should see how it feels by sending my website to a few friends. (hey! it’s worth a shot!)

SEO

Initially, when I searched for “sudorandom” on google, it would redirect me to “pseudorandom”. It was literally impossible to search for my website using the exact name. This appears to have been changed but I think it does signal a problem with the name from an SEO standpoint.

I know my name isn’t the most unique. The more famous of the men sharing my name is a Canadian actor. But he’s quite a bit older than me so what I should really be fighting for is to beat the Scottish footballer, who was born in the same year I was. But my point here is that using an alias like sudorandom doesn’t help my name SEO at all.

Finally, it’s four letters long. With a name this short it must have some SEO magic.

longevity

I’m not sure what I will want to focus on in the future. I’ve had periods where I was obsessed with a space-based MMO and another period where I loved learning about optical networking. Who knows, I may take up teaching people cringy Danish/English puns after my wife and daughter ban me from the practice around them.

The beauty of kmcd.dev is that it doesn’t restrict me to a specific topic. As my interests evolve, the website name remains relevant, allowing me to explore new technologies and share my knowledge with you.

skål!

Overall, rebranding to kmcd.dev offers a clearer, shorter, and more professional website name that strengthens my personal brand in the long run.