In the spring of 2019, we had been talking for nearly a year about building a software toolkit to help automate what many people already do informally—track symptoms and statistically evaluate the effects of various treatments. As the idea started to jell, we started casting about for names for the toolkit.
Though there are a variety of scientific names for the methods that the WWB toolkit borrows from— single person trial, n-of-1 trial— none of them inspired any enthusiasm.
One day, headed to the car for a brief vacation, I realized I’d forgotten my blood thinner medications. (I had a pulmonary embolism last fall.) Walking out of my home holding two bottles of best selling blood thinners — Xarelto and Elequis — one in each hand, I was thinking about the wooziness that sometimes seemed to occur while I was on the blood thinners.
I weighed both bottles and asked myself out loud, “which works best?”
I knew, from reading and conversations, that this exact question is incredibly common for people struggling to find the right solution—behavior, medicine, supplements—for chronic health conditions. Luckily, the domain name was available!
WhichWorksBest is a creation of Pressflex LLC, which has been around since 1998. The name WhichWorksBest? ties into the fairly literal, “just the facts” naming conventions that Pressflex has used for other ventures.
For example, Pressflex was founded to help newspapers and magazines get online flexibly and affordably. Blogads, which we launched in 2002, was an automated service to help bloggers sell ads. Pullquote, launched in 2011, helps people store and share interesting quotes. AdBiblio, launched in 2014, helps book publishers advertise online. Racery, also launched in 2014, helps companies and charities build and host virtual races.
One remaining puzzle. Very few companies — or zero? — have a question mark in their logo. If WhichWorksBest? ever ends up in a headline, this may confuse readers. But the questionmark also conveys the confusion and questioning that is at the heart of WhichWorksBest?
