Yep, the name of the game today in the bowling ball manufacturing business is to introduce a ball, follow it up with at least 2 or 3 more variations on it (spaced about 2 months between the introduction of each added ball), run the entire line for 12-18 months, then dump the entire line and start all over again with new names and tweaks.
Sooner or later, the ball manufacturers are going to run out of names, coverstock tweaks, core tweaks, and color tweaks, and who knows what will happen when that time comes (which isn't far away!). Of course, occasionally a manufacturer will bring back a slight variation on an old "classic" ball, and they will modify the name ever so slightly but stay close enough that you can identify it with the older ball (such as the El Nino 2000 replacing the El Nino). Columbia occasionally brings back one of their best sellers such as the Pulse, but even these remakes only survive on the market for 9-12 months before they too are discontinued.
One of the only "good" things about the steady turnover in ball names is that you can sometimes pick up a closeout sale price on a good ball. But, if you find a ball that you REALLY like, you'd better buy up a spare one or two to put back for a later date, since you never know if you will be able to find another one again or not. I really liked the Complete Chaos, and I pretty much used up 3 of them (they all died due to excessive oil absorption)....but, I still have 2 brand new ones, already drilled, sitting back for a rainy day. Same thing goes for the Trauma Response...I liked it well enough that I put back 2 brand new ones, drilled and ready to roll, when I decide to retire the one that I'm currently using.
The days of a ball name surviving for 5 years are pretty much gone, unless you are talking about some of the lower technology balls such as the "Dot" plastic line of Columbia....balls such as the Blue Dot and White Dot continue on, since the market demand is still high enough to justify their existance.
