Visited Athens. I liked it a lot. It looked like a college town. Could not face Columbus traffic, so I gave tOSU a pass. Maybe i missed out. My frame of reference was the University of Texas, another big state university embedded in the state capital city. I was underwhelmed with UT's campus. It was hard to tell where the campus ended and the city began.Technically, we are the only Ohio State University. There is no other school with that name. There is also an Ohio University, located in the state of Ohio - note the different name.
I have no problem with trademarking "The" in connection with "Ohio State University," I guess. It does sound a little insecure, though. It sounds like the proponents are a little worried that folks might mistake the University of Ohio for tOSU.I know why the idiots added "The" a while back and have always thought it was stupid. If your reputation as a university is not enough to adequately distinguish you from the other schools in the state, the name really doesn't matter. And our reputation has been suffering of late, so this just makes the school look worse.