"spaz" is indeed short for "spastic", but it's not typically seen as an ableist slur like it is in the UK. Presumably, the word had been out of use as a term for people with cerebral palsy long enough in the US that it passed through the "Euphemism treadmill"[1], and is no longer associated with actual disability (similar to "imbecile" or "moron").
BTW I find it telling, that the entire thread has been flagged and killed. If you tell someone in Germany unfamiliar with the NoSQL space that you plan on using "MongoDB" they'll look at you like you said you plan to use "R*tardDB".
It's a genuine real-life problem and the general category of problems is especially well-known in the marketing space. It's probably more widely known in Europe than the US (where English-only is historically the norm) but there are a few examples that occasionally get brought up on HN (e.g. the island "Laputa" being named differently in Spanish editions of works featuring it, although the unfortunate implication possibly being intentional in that case).
Outside the database space there's also Wix, who after problems getting traction in Germany tried to "own" the implication of their name by using "Ich wixe" ("I jerk off" but misspelled) or "Ich bin ein Wixer" ("I'm a wanker" but misspelled) in their German ads. I don't see any company being able to pull this off with a name that sounds like an ableist slur though.
I'm not saying Americans are (intentionally) ableist when they say "spaz" but it's definitely a word that can provoke very different reactions when used in an international context. I don't know enough about the etymology to say whether it's like "fanny" (which refers to two very different body parts depending on which country you're from) or "c*nt" (which pretty much means the same thing regardless of where you're from but can either be a friendly taunt or extreme insult because of cultural differences) but it's certainly something to be aware of.
This isn't the kind of problem you'd want to have with the name of your product is all I'm saying. I guess I'm just happy FerretDB didn't go with SpazDB.
German doesn't have a "th" sound (okay, technically it's more correct to say German has neither of the two "th" sounds as this is an important difference when pointing out that English only has one of the two German "ch" sounds and only in some variants of English and almost exclusively in Scottish words but I digress).
But based on my experience it's a coin toss whether German speakers who don't know enough English to be able to make an attempt at pronouncing it will go for "trottel" or "srottel" in that case, with the latter being even more likely if they go by ear rather than reading the word spelled out.
