Dominion So far my main theory has been that it's a "forum with flair."
Basically spot on. (But yes, more flare than flair.)
When brainstorming names, I was trying to play on the word "forum". And as @Fastidious said, come up with something that is short and Latin-ish. Originally I was going to go with "Florum", and use the idea of floral/flowers/growing to underly the brand... but in hindsight, thankfully the TLD wasn't available π
At first I pronounced Flarum with a sharper "A" sound, as in "lab" and "tab" βΒ and Laravel. But when I showed the word to people, more seemed to be instinctively pronouncing it as in flare/flair. So I decided to go with the flow.
