But ... it was on the internet!!!

[Nyufrost]

So, it must be true, ya? Especially if 3 or 4 people get together and all believe it at once?

What I am referring to is the 90's name change of Kentucky Fried Chicken to KFC. Thanks to an internet rumor that circulated like a wildfire, MANY people believe that they had to change their name because they were breeding mutant chickens with no feet, no beaks and extra legs ... depending on which version you read.

I know people who swear this is true *because* they saw it on the internet.

Now, I have always known that was a wild and crazy story but I never did really know the real reason until I stumbled across it tonight. I double checked it and it seems to hold true.

Without looking it up ... does anyone know the REAL reason KFC changed their name from Kentucky Fried Chicken ... or care to make a guess?

[OmegaFrost]

I would geuss that they arent using chicken is a fact however they probably arent using mutants either. They are probably just using a cheap chicken supplement such as pork or tofu or something like that. Or they just stopped frying their chicken and bake it instead?

[Gigafrost]

Well, personally I find "KFC" to be catchier than "Kentucky Fried Chicken" and people were probably calling it KFC before when it was Kentucky Fried Chicken.

As for mutant chickens with no beaks and extra legs, to my knowledge we can't even do that. We can change the kinds of protein produced in goat milk, change the by-product of bacterial replication, but the removal of limbs is something completely different. It's possible to do, but you'd have to understand the genetic code so well and be able to manipulate it so well that you pretty much understand what everything does. This is *way* ahead of our time. While we might have an inkling as to what kind of protein a part of the genetic code might make, how does it function with the other proteins produced to make the cell function? And how does the functioning of the cell work to replicate in a precise manner to form a complete entity? You'd pretty much have to re-write most of the genetic code in order to get rid of their feet and beaks, not to mention to add extra legs.

Of course, you could selectively breed, but even then I'm not sure if it would be possible to get rid of the beaks and feet, and very impossible to grow extra legs, plus I'd imagine that it'd take a significantly long time if it *were* possible. There would be problems of keeping the chickens nutritious enough to be "harvestable", and they wouldn't be able to do the breeding themselves if they can't move.

Bleh. When I hear that FDA officials and Scientific American journalists raid the place to A) crack down on such an operation and B) Report this complex work of modern humans, or maybe even just a C) Reliable news source talking about it, then maybe I'll be willing to consider the feet-less, beak-less, extra-leg chicken theory.

[Some Unreg Punk]

no they still fry the chicken. I worked there for awhile during the summer.

Pretty much threw chicken into wireframe caskets and threw a set of four caskets into a deep oil fryer.

[Nyufrost]

Yes ... they *do* use real non-mutant chicken and they *do* fry it ... any more guesses before I give the answer?

[tsian]

They probably changed their name because the marketing department said it would be cool. I believe it was HP who recently did that among a score of other companies.

[Spudgun]

A move to de-emphasize "chicken" because KFC planned to offer a varied menu that included other types of food. (The Boston Chicken corporation took the same approach for the same reason, changing their name of their retail food outlets to Boston Market.)

A desire to eliminate the word "fried," which has negative connotations to the increasingly health-conscious consumer market.

A recent trend towards the abbreviation of long commercial titles, as demonstrated by other companies' employing shortened forms of their names, such as The International House of Pancakes (IHOP) and Howard Johnson's (HoJo).

Also people in certain countries found it difficult to say "Kentucky Fried Chicken"... "KFC" is a lot easier.

[Nyufrost]

That's a good answer but here is the real reason they changed it ....

In the early 90's, the state of Kentucky --feced with bankruptcy-- decided to copyright the word Kentucky and charge licensing fees to those using the name.

Kentucky Fried Chicken did not want to have to pay so they changed their name to KFC.

At least, that's the story HERE

I didn't want to spend a lot of time researching it but I did see a few links on Yahoo search that seemed to support that story.