The perils of Naming

[kengr]

On the bus today, I was watching for my stop, and so I saw this young lady get on. While she was fumbling for enough change to pay her fare, I couldn't help but notice her first name blazoned across the back of the hoodie she was wearing (later, when she turned to walk down the aisle, I saw that the hoodie was for her high school swim team. Go her!)

As soon as I saw the name, I winced inside. Why? Her name is Alexa.

Knowing teenagers, I'm sure she's had to put up with more than a few stupid jokes.

And it's not as if her parents could have foreseen that her name would be a problem. And I'm sure the engineers tried to pick a less common name.

Comments

[alatefeline]

Yes. I've encountered the name as well.

[fayanora]

That's so sad. Alexa, play Despacito.

[siliconshaman]

Don't laugh... I saw a young girl called Cortana the other day... she had a younger friend [or sister perhaps] with her called Siri. I had to bite my tongue to stop myself laughing on the bus when I overheard their names.

I think they were named after their namesakes... but you never know...

Although, if they have a baby sister at home called Alexa, I would not be surprised.

[kengr]

I think it's a bit too soon for kids of the the age you seem to be implying to have been named after the devices.

Yep, Alexa is only 4 years old (released in November of 2014.

Cortana was released in April 2014. Ok, Siri was released in April, 2011. so that one is long enough.

And to round things out, I can't get a definite date for Mycroft, but it was definitely around in 2015.

[siliconshaman]

Actually, that makes sense, given the girls apparent age. I could've easily been mistaken about which one was which, and they were both easily in the sub-ten years old range. With the younger one being about half the older one's age I'd guess.. not that I'm actually very good at guessing ages. [I usually err on the side of younger, as that's safer.]

I dunno... maybe Cortana was named after the Halo games? and their parents just went with the theme when her baby sister arrived? [Cortana the A.I assistant was imported from the game Halo, and has been around a lot longer]

[kengr]

She could be named after the sword (which is what the Halo character is likely named after).

[siliconshaman]

There's a sword?! Ok, I guess that's a possibility too... and who knows, maybe little Siri's name isn't spelt the same way as the A.I's...

Still unfortunate though...

[kengr]

Yes, there's a sword. I think I first heard about it while reading H. Beam Piper's "Space Vikings" (they had a tendency to name their ships after famous swords)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtana

[fayanora]

Tom Cruise's daughter is Siri too...

[fayanora]

Mycroft? Does that one solve mysteries?

Seriously, I've never heard of Mycroft before in this context.

[kengr]

Mycroft is referenced in the wki articles about Siri, alexa and Cortana. It's Linux version of the same sort of thing.

The name is based on the self-aware computer in Heinlein's "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress"

[fayanora]

Now I have this desire to program my own digital assistant and name it Hal. Sadly, I do not know how to program anything.

[kengr]

Heinlein's The Number of the Beast had an AI of sorts in a small aircraft/spaceship. Named Dejah Thoris (because her owner was named John Carter). Deety for short.

Early on she was less intelligent and more a case of using some *simple* algorithms to pick at random from sets of choices based on keywords.

Which actually does a good job of fooling many people.

Some folks wrote a program to do the same sort of thing... in BASIC for the Tandy Model 100. Which has at most 32k of RAM.

I've got a copy of the code around somewhere.

Writing Hal would be easy. anything it doesn't understand can get a response of "I'm sorry, I can't do that Dave."

[fayanora]

"anything it doesn't understand can get a response of "I'm sorry, I can't do that Dave.""

Yes, my thought exactly!

Could be worse

[ng_moonmoth]

I once helped a friend who was compiling info for an upcoming class reunion for his (Marin County CA) high school. One of his classmates who had reproduced sometime before 1977 chose a name for the child that may not have worked out well: Darth.

On the other hand, that's the sort of name teenagers might think was really cool for a while. Nevertheless, it seems to me to be a tough name to carry around, let alone decide whether you want to live up to it. Hope they had a good middle name they could go by.

Re: Could be worse

[kengr]

I used to babysit a friend's kid. Named Grendel Erin [family name].

Roughly translated from the relevant languages: Monster Peaceful

In the early grades at school he went by Patrick. Then he had two other Patricks in his class. so he went back to his legal name.

don't know if his name ever caused him any trouble. I quit babysitting when he was 4, and just heard things about him from his mom via mutual friends.

Then came the day when I felt *old*. I was at an SCA event and I was introduced to this strapping young warrior who was (from what he'd just picked up) old enough to drink.

It was Grendel. Oy...