Popular entertainment media software Kodi has broken its years-long traditional name selection process this year to honor the late Carrie Fisher. The Star Wars actress passed away late last month following a heart attack. Nathan Betzen of Kodi said in a statement that the company’s next-gen Kodi 18 would be code named ‘Leia,” after the iconic character that Carrie Fisher portrayed in Star Wars.
Kodi 18 is still a long time away
Interestingly, 2017 is a special year for the Star Wars universe. The Franchise would turn 40 on May 25th. At this point, it is unclear when Kodi 18 would arrive and what new features it would introduce. The Kodi 17 Krypton is still in the works, and its first Release Candidate was made available only a couple of weeks ago.
Kodi 17 is expected to be released sometime this year. The company released Kodi 16.1 Jarvis in April 2016. Krypton would bring many gaming-related features such as a generic and user mappable cross-platform joystick. The final version of Kodi 18 Leia is unlikely to be available to the public before late 2017 or early next year.
‘Leia’ was not even in top 10 user suggestions
Traditionally, the Kodi team runs a poll to decide what to name its next big release. In early December, the team had asked its community members to vote for the name of Kodi 18, which should start with the letter “L.” The team had already compiled a large list of names including some excellent ones. But then the news of Carrie Fisher’s tragic demise came.
The Kodi team loves Princess Leia. They thought there could not be a more fitting tribute to Fisher than to name a version of Kodi after the character she played. So, they ditched the traditional process. Notably, ‘Leia’ was not even a top ten choice in user suggestions. Kodi called her “one of the most butt-kicking princesses in cinematic history.” Let’s hope Kodi 18 lives up to its code name.
