RE: Hive...? Or can we choose a different name?
If you want to go with the water theme and keep the minnow, dolphin etc... why not "Ocean"?
The Ocean makes up over 2/3 of the planet and is a vast, rich ecosystem with all walks of life - but I don't know if there's already a blockchain out there, I just thought of this point as I was reading your post.
I'm not overly sold on the name "Hive" myself, does seem a little insular but I get the point that it needs to resemble what this place is about, which is...?
As for the bit about not being consulted... that's kinda the point of your witness vote isn't it? You vote for those who resemble your ideals and they take the difficult decisions to govern the blockchain's direction (once 17 out of 20 agree) on your behalf. If they do something against your ideals then you remove your vote, simple as that? Unless I'm missing something here.
I like the Ocean idea! And I actually almost mentioned that myself in the original post, but, for whatever reason I think just to keep it simple I didn't mention that, but I almost did and I think Ocean would be a lot more appeal in a lot more ways than Hive. Or at least some variation of ocean perhaps a different or unique spelling of it or something.
And yeah, I dunno if there is one out there already or not, but if you put your own spin to it like steem did with "steam", then you should be able to find a way to make it work if you're creative, unfortunately it seems the name is final unless we do a campaign in the future to have it changed and I'm not sure that's a good idea... shrug
And yeah. "insular" is a good word to describe it. Sort of enclosed as opposed to more open.
I thought this place was about decentralization and freedom, but... It seems some of those principles continue to be undermined in the argument of necessity sort of like how the US government passed the Patriot Act after 9/11. They use emergency times to push certain things through using secrecy. It's a bit of a concern, though, not sure there's much I can do other than to mention it when I see it and talk about it with peoples.
If it was the top 20 witnesses I'd have less issue, though, I'm not sure we know who it was since it was secret. How do we even know? We just sorta have to take their word for it?
Also, yes the witnesses and top 20 in particular should do certain things, but, I'm not sure they should choose our new name in secret and I think creating the name would be a great decentralized thing for everyone to take part in for a lot of reasons.