I'd think I'm far from the only one who finds CockroachDB simply repulsive merely for its name.

OT, but I refer to it as RoachDB and that helps a lot.

Roach could be a last name, or a type of chocolate...

Roach is often used as a synonym for cockroach

Or a basically finished joint

I can vouch that I avoided deploying it in corp environments due to the questionable name. "Element" is fine and is generic just like "Matrix". So name really does matter (specially in formal/corporate environments).

Your comment doesn't mean much if your company is on Slack. The "Slack" name can present issues for other people just like "Riot" has presented for you.

Yes, even in 2016 I had non-techies think that an IM chat designed for the workplace called "Slack" was some sort of joke.

purely anecdotal but I've seen it twice that a piece of software was rejected because of a weird name.

Probably doesn't happen often, but there's people when they have a few alternatives they'll just throw the strange sounding one out first.