Marvel Chronology Project

This question is slightly off topic, but I was wondering how it is decided what "number" a timeline gets. (e.g. 616 vs. 5901, etc.) I assume there is some sort of centralized authority so that the same number is not used for different timelines; but is it the editor-in-chief? Some committee of high-level editors? Or is any "unused" number basically up for grabs?

I think they're supposed to be random, by their very nature, but if you look closely, you can suss out that some of them are tied to the year & month they debuted.

The designation of at least one -- Earth 3588 ("the Taco Bell-verse") -- is an inside joke.

The numbers are semi-random - as Russ notes, there's a system often used involving publication dates, in homage to how fans originally speculated Moore got the initial 616 that kicked it all off, but that's mainly because if people "choose numbers at random" you generally find you are not really being all that random. As for who chooses them? In some cases it's the original writers who first showed a given reality have been asked and have supplied them. Other times it is the handbook's senior writer, either because the original writer left the choice to the handbooks or wasn't contactable. We do have a list of reality designators, including ones given by other fictions (not just comics either) where we know of them, to try and avoid reusing ones given elsewhere.

Is there somewhere we can find a complete list of the universe designations?

The Marvel Multiverse
http://www.marvunapp.com/ohotmu/appendixes/ccdapp.htm
http://www.marvunapp.com/master/earthteaz.htm#numbered
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiverse_(Marvel_Comics)

and for good measure the DC Multiverse
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_DC ... rse_worlds