Why Was It Called This Way?

As it turns out, the name ‘Google Wave’ was inspired by the American TV-series called ‘Firefly‘ aired in 2002 in US and Canada.

In the series, a Wave was the means of electronic communication (very often it consisted of a video call or a video message).

During the developer preview, one of the ‘fathers’ of Google Wave, Lars Rasmussen used the word “shiny“, (it was often used in the series in the meaning of ‘cool’), he also used a direct quote from the series “Curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal!“.