[kweingar]

When you use alternative brand names, you are cementing your story as taking place in an alternate universe of sorts. That works for some readers and for some stories, but for others it can be even more distracting than regular brand references.

To use your example, if I am reading a book set in mid-2010s Seattle and a character is wandering down Pike Street after a bad date, it would be jarring to see them using an app called “Pesterchum”

[dale_glass]

There's plenty odd brands for everything in the real world too. There's Ubuntu Cola, Migo phones, and AbiWord, to name a few examples.

[aardvark179]

But having a character in novel use such a brand has to be a conscious choice and say something about that character. Why are they drinking an odd brand of cola, or using an unusual sort of phone?

[dale_glass]

Why? Tying brands to identity is a weird thing. Companies aren't static anyway. I switch brands depending on how the wind blows at the time of purchase.

[waveBidder]

yes but that itself tells something about who you are, and precludes stories about certain kinds of people. not that I really want to read about them