Here I was thinking Blizzard, which would have been most assuredly cool:)
As an Oregonian, I’d have to say that it would have been hilarious if your outfit changed its name to “The Beaver Co.”, thus leading many software consumers to wonder if you were in the cyberporn industry. 
“Big Sky” isn’t such a terrible name, but I would have been seriously chapped at the charade management made its employees go through picking out a name when they had already decided on one. It smacks of dishonesty, and can do nothing but sow distrust among the workforce.
While reading this, I just had this flash of companies actually naming themselves honestly;
“Screw The Environment Oil & Gas”; “We’re Not Even Looking for a Cure Pharmaceuticals”; “We Don’t Care If You Did It If You’re Money’s Good, Attorneys at Law”. Hee.
I want someone to start a store called “Cheap Plastic Crap Ltd.”
www.bigsky.biz It just took a few minutes to find it. (No, no site is up yet. No, I won’t tell you now I know this is the domain. It’s very easy to find out, but if you don’t know who to find such things out, I won’t tell you. So there. ) :o
Well, look at it this way. The name could have been “Goat Felchers Unlimited”. This is not exactly a suitable name, but at least it doesn’t induce vomiting, or something.
That should be: “but if you don’t know how to find such things out, I won’t tell you.”
Hmm…
Lightnin’ - I hope my mention of the domain won’t mess things up for you. I should have thought of that before I posted.
But, in my experience, I think it’s highly unlikely that anyone from your company will find this board from that one mention of the not-yet-existant website. But…perhaps it’s better safe than sorry. In which case, the mods can remove the domain before anyone can find it! (And, my apologies.)
Maybe you can buy the rights to Big Sky Trooper. That was a great game for the SNES. 
The whois record for your domain name shows an address for an apartment complex. Are you guys based out of an apartment?
Nah, that’s not us. Our name’s supposed to be similar… and no, we’re not out of an apartment.
Please, guys, don’t look further… or at least, don’t post if you do. I can easily see them getting pissed about this sort of thing. I honestly can’t remember whether we’re supposed to actually mention this to the world, or not.
I think I’m mentally blocking on that meeting…
Upon further review, Lightnin’, I think you’re being a tad bit harsh on your management, on this issue at least. It IS management’s job to make sure you have a good corporate name, and they SHOULD have more experience and knowledge of what makes a good name than the average staffer. I think Big Sky is a nice enough name, I wouldn’t bat an eye buying a game from “Big Sky”.
That said, my guess is that the execs discussed names amongst themselves and thought Big Sky was good, but wanted more input, maybe a staffer would come up with a great name they hadn’t thought of. So they offer this incentive, get a bunch of names from the staff, and decide to keep Big Sky. No biggie, and rather than give the prize to an executive, they throw a party for the whole company, not too bad.
If they were real scumbags, they would have announced “I’d like to congratulate Joe Blowhard, Director of Marketing, for winning the renaming contest. He thinks the $1,000 prize will definitely help with the downpayment on his new Porsche.”
Of course, one of you could’ve won the contest and wound up with a nice, shiny apple on your desk, similar to this sucker:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=108378 an apple is a “juicy prize” isn’t it? 
Geesh, another case of “You shouldn’t post items on this board that you wouldn’t want the world to know about”. When will you guys ever learn. The very people that you don’t think read this board…BRIGHT LIGHTS… read this board.
Geesh, another case of “You shouldn’t post items on this board that you wouldn’t want the world to know about”. When will you guys ever learn. The very people that you don’t think read this board…BRIGHT LIGHTS… read this board .:wally
Fricken double post
As another viewpoint from a game afficionado, I don’t think the name’s terrible. It is, however, irrelevant. I buy games based on reviews and word of mouth and demos–corporate identities behind them matter not one whit.
That’s the kind of thing that management probably doesn’t want to hear, though. But it sounds like they could stand to lose some self-esteem.
Big Sky isn’t so bad. Although, I do like “The Beaver Company” then you could have the motto: “Making pussy of the competition.” . 
Out of curiosity, what were some of your picks?
I was going to guess “Tarheel”, “Keystone” or “Land of Enchantment”.
Beats all hell out of the games company which produced CRPGs (y’know–knights and elves and blood and axes and swords and such) formerly known as “Legion”-- a year after changing their name to “Mentor”, they folded.
-David
For the record, my choice was “Fireant”. Everyone seemed to like that one.
There was a game company (notice the past tense) a few years ago… named “Titanic”.
Jeez, that just takes balls.
Hey at least it means SOMETHING. A few years ago I worked for a company that had a name that actaully told what we did. We did CADD work, maps etc. They wanted to change the name so they did the same thing for us. There were a couple of good names, but the owner of the company was the one who picked the name. I think he went to the Dilbert site and had it throw a name out there. It was full of buzz words and meant nothing. The company didn’t go under, but a lot of us did get laid off soon after.