China’s New Baby Name: ‘Olympics’

China, in between untangling masses of monstrous green algae and making it difficult for anyone to actually get to the Games by clamping down on visas, has adopted one helpful innovation courtesy of Olympic fever: a new baby name. ↵↵Due to the overreliance on certain standard names, the Chinese have a serious problem coming up with new, distinct names. As the Times points out, the billion plus population of the People’s Republic uses a set of only 100 surnames, meaning you can come up with fun, suggestive facts all day like this one: ↵

↵↵⇥If all the Wangs in China seceded — all 93 million — they would become the world’s 12th-most-populous nation. ↵↵ ↵

China is no longer in danger of losing their collective supply of Wangs of course, but as you can imagine this makes record-keeping very, very complicated. Thus, you should not be surprised that 4,104 Chinese babies since 1992 have been named “Aoyun,” or “Olympics.” If you don’t quite understand what a prestige project this is for the Chinese yet: they’re naming babies after it. The side effect of actually having a unique name in the PRC is just a pleasant bonus. (And yes, sharing a name with only four thousand people in China is considered a small pool. Remember: 1.3 billion neighbors here.) ↵
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↵Meanwhile, there is a very high probability that you won’t even watch it, you rude American you, which is why NBC is hedging its bets and offering content not only across its web of networks, but also online. While you may not give a rat’s ass about the Games, you probably like them better than you like your job. NBC is betting you’ll watch the high jump instead of completing your latest billing report, and considering that you’re reading this right now ... there’s a good chance that’s a winning bet.↵