
Put an end to people mispronouncing your name - obvio
http://namez.com
======
mattzito
Yeah, I think it's a clever concept, but it seems almost egotistical to say,
"Look, I care enough about how you pronounce my last name to _embed a link in
my email sig_ "

Many people classically mispronounced my name - it's not a big deal, I move
on. If we're not going to be having many conversations where you say my last
name, I'm not even going to correct you.

~~~
CocaKoala
I dunno; as somebody who's name gets mispronounced essentially all the time,
I'm pretty sensitive about trying to pronounce other people's names properly.
If they embed the pronunciation in their email, then a) I don't have to ask,
and b) I can practice on my own time with a reference to make sure I have it
correct. It's nice of them.

~~~
pavel_lishin
My name gets mispronounced, too, and I'm fine with it - I actually _prefer_
the incorrectly pronounced version of my name.

It has taught me, though, that when someone tells you "you can just call me
X", you should _not_ keep asking them how to _really_ pronounce their name. If
you're an American, you are not going to be able to fluently pronounce some
non-Indo-European names. It's downright rude to quiz people for minutes on end
as to how their name is "really" pronounced. If you don't get it on the second
try, just go with what they're comfortable with.

~~~
taejo
> non-Indo-European names

Are Persian or Polish names easier than Hawaiian or Japanese?

~~~
eru
German names are hard enough for monolingual English speakers.

~~~
ward
Yet to encounter a monolingual English speaker to be able to pronounce my
first name "Ward" (Dutch speaking Belgian). Only one I know of was someone who
had spent several years in Paris (so he knew French and wasn't actually in the
monolingual category anymore).

I recorded this one several years ago:
[http://wardje.eu/dll/ward.wav](http://wardje.eu/dll/ward.wav)

Let's not even get started on my last name...

~~~
pavel_lishin
Wow, yup, that would definitely... take some practice to get right.

I did something similar on YouTube, specifying the way I prefer Americans to
pronounce my name:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfTkEaZSMXo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfTkEaZSMXo)

------
nat
I don't think this will help as much as they hope it will. In my experience,
people are generally incapable of pronouncing anything, even when it is said
to their face.

My name is Nat, which is about as simple a name as you could ask for. But
quite often, I will introduce myself, "Hi, I'm Nat", and the response will be
"Nice to meet you, Nate". My wife experiences it too (even from her mother!),
so I don't think my pronunciation is the problem here.

Is this kind of vowel sloppiness more common in the US? Or should I just take
the hint and change my name?

~~~
shazow
Or even worse: When a barista takes my name for my order, I say "Andrey."
Usually they'll spell it "Andre" but whatever.

Five minutes later, more often than not, they call out "Aubrey." That's
reading their own handwriting.

You can't explain that.

:P

~~~
CodeMage
It can get worse than that ;)

I originally come from Serbia, but I spent the last 14 years in Chile, where
most people seemed to choke on my name: Vojislav. When pronounced correctly,
it's "voice love", but nobody outside the territory of ex-Yugoslavia knows how
to read it correctly.

When it came to buying coffee and stuff like that, I had the choice of
explaining my name ad nauseum or adopting an easier one. I decided to call
myself "Boris", thanks to telemarketers who would recover from my name by
changing it to something they could deal with ;-)

Anyway, that worked quite fine for years and years, until it started failing,
ironically at the Starbucks inside a mall with the highest concentration of
tourists and immigrants. I would say "Boris" and two times out of five they
would write down "Maurice".

The cherry on top inevitable came five minutes later, when a different barista
would call out "Mauricio".

Fortunately, I moved before I gave in to temptation to do what a friend of
mine did on a regular basis: give "Spongebob" as his name :P

~~~
philwelch
I had a Serbian coworker once named Dragan. Despite how awesome his name was,
he often went by "Mike", usually for similar reasons.

------
restalis
I read here comments about personal experiences with mispronounced names and
how this is looked upon as having little or no importance. I'm shocked. The
name is the first and foremost part of one's identity. Why would it be
acceptable to be corrupted for someone's convenience? It's like "...look, I
don't fancy your name much, so I shall call you [...]! It's fine with you,
right?" I may keep quiet in response, for not having much control over how I'm
being called, but no - it is not and it should not be "fine". It's just about
the first modicum of mutual respect as interlocutors.

The world gets globalized, so please -- when come in contact with the folks
living outside your courtyard, be prepared to accept at least some small self-
change as consequence.

~~~
goldenkey
If someone gets your name wrong , you correct them if you care. It's only
disrespect if that person continues to mispronounce your name. And even in
that case, the person may have a mental factuality defect and mean no malice.
This site is ridiculous and so is your justification. Being stern about your
name is such an egotistical attitude

~~~
restalis
_It 's only disrespect if that person continues to mispronounce your name._

I agree. When I present myself, I pronounce my name. Most of the time people
people just follow and it feels like a courtesy at best, but there are cases
when there's this attitude of entitlement to rename you, and that you are the
one that should follow.

 _the person may have a mental factuality defect and mean no malice._

I haven't suggested to be necessarily malice from the mispronouncers. It may
be lack of... many things that become desirable in a globalized society.

 _This site is ridiculous and so is your justification. Being stern about your
name is such an egotistical attitude_

The site may be ridiculous, but the problem it tries to address feels real to
me. You may not perceive it to be a problem because either you haven't a name
that can be easily contorted, or because you have different values in your
life. I care about my name and I only ask the same care from others, the same
way I try my best to reciprocate that kind of respect when I'm being asked.

------
mariusz79
My problem is not with people mispronouncing my name but modifying it to
something easier for them.. No you may not call me Mario, or Martin.
Mispronounce it! I don't care, just don't change it to something different!

~~~
PeterGriffin
Or you can adopt a short nickname everyone can say right, and put the entire
problem behind you.

There are more important things in this short life. A name is just a bunch of
random sounds so when someone talks, you know they mean you.

~~~
oblio
His name is probably "Marius". That's about as short as it gets as a name...

~~~
PeterGriffin
It's a great name, but it has three syllables and is uncommon enough for
people to wonder if they should pronounce the "s" as he himself demonstrated.

There's a reason you know William Gates and William Clinton as Bill Gates and
Bill Clinton. Richard Cheney knows short name is so important, he'd rather be
called "Dick" rather than his full name, "Richard".

Short always wins. Mark isn't bad, by the way.

 _Marius "Mark" Capone._

Yup. Great.

~~~
CocaKoala
It's pretty easy to imagine that somebody might get attached to their given
name; maybe they were named for their grandparent, of whom they have a lot of
fond memories. Maybe it's a connection to their family that they really
cherish. Maybe they just really like the way their full name flows together.
Suggesting that somebody "just change" their name to something that's only
vaguely related because "it's just a collection of random syllables" seems to
kind of miss the point of a name.

~~~
PeterGriffin
You suggest the point of a name is false associations and nostalgia. I think
you're missing the point of a name.

The point of a name is so people don't refer to you as "hey you, the tall guy
with the blue shirt". That's really it.

By the way, I have shortened my name. Saves a lot of trouble.

~~~
CocaKoala
The point of a name is so that people have an easy way to refer to you; so
what? The point of anything is purely utilitarian, and people still get
attached to them. I got a cat so that I wouldn't feel as lonely when my
housemates went on long trips; that doesn't mean that after taking care of her
for four years I'd be happy swapping my cat for a different one, even though
they might be functionally identical as far as cats go.

People get attached to cars, books, CDs, photos, musical instruments, and all
manner of things. A name is honestly one of the least-weird things to form an
attachment to. The point is, that's not the only point to a name.

~~~
PeterGriffin
Please don't compare one's attachment to another living being (like a cat) to
attachment to objects, or even worse, intangible symbols (like a name).

A tendency to apply high value to symbols, instead of substance is a property
I've noticed in less sophisticated people. They can't tell (or weren't taught
to tell) apart symbol and substance, but symbols are way simpler, so they
focus on the symbols.

Works for them to a degree. But it's stupid. Symbols exist only point to
something else. Maybe being named after your grandfather means a lot to you as
a symbol, but no one else feels that way. To them it's just your name.

And one is not honoring their grandfather by being particularly stubborn about
their weird name, they're just being silly, and harming themselves.

You honor those you respect through your actions, not by wearing hollow badges
(like using a specific name). By the way, I was named after my grandfather.

~~~
CocaKoala
>A tendency to apply high value to symbols, instead of substance is a property
I've noticed in less sophisticated people.

This is a wonderful sentence. I recently got married, and I wouldn't trade my
wedding ring for ten times the gold value in cash, because I cherish it as a
symbol of my commitment to my wife, and a symbol of our love for each other.
Does that make me "less sophisticated" than somebody who looks at their
wedding ring and says "Gold prices are up from when we got married; let's cash
this sucker in and make some profit"?

Am I stupid for not doing that? Is it silly that I cherish my wedding ring
more than somebody on the street, because to me it's a symbol of my marriage
and to them it's just my ring?

It's fine if you want to adopt an utterly robotic and value-driven outlook on
life, but it's silly to expect everybody else to do the same, and it's
ridiculous to say that people who refuse to be similarly robotic are somehow
"less sophisticated" than your utterly logical and enlightened self.

edit: you keep on pointing out how you do X, like how you've shortened your
name, or you were named for your grandfather, and I guess I don't understand
why because it doesn't matter. What you choose to do doesn't have that much of
a bearing on what other people choose to do, and just because you're willing
to change your name doesn't mean other people should have to.

~~~
PeterGriffin
> Does that make me "less sophisticated" than somebody who looks at their
> wedding ring and says "Gold prices are up from when we got married; let's
> cash this sucker in and make some profit"?

They wouldn't buy a ring in the first place.

~~~
CocaKoala
That'd dodging the question and you know it. Maybe the ring is a family
heirloom passed down for generations. Still not sophisticated? What about the
person who's father left them his vintage 1913 archtop guitar, and they don't
really play it that often but have fond memories of listening to their dad
noodle around and play blues music in the evening?

Is it more reasonable to say that nobody should attach emotional value to any
inanimate object, or to say that people have the right to decide by which name
they'd like to be referred to, and that as a matter of basic respect you
should put some effort in to learning how people want their names to be
pronounced?

~~~
silencio
Surprised you're still commenting...

My husband and I also recently got married (congrats to you and your partner
from us!) and we designed our rings from scratch - mine with a diamond
alternative stone - as seen here:
[http://cl.ly/image/3A3R24042w0C](http://cl.ly/image/3A3R24042w0C).
PeterGriffin would probably proceed to tell us that our rings are still just
garbage sentimental trinkets distracting us from the "substance" of our
relationship despite us "making stories" with them.

Nothing about spending the money to get our rings says that we can't also
honor what the rings stand for by doing other things. Doesn't matter what
anyone else thinks. That doesn't even come into the equation.

The same could be said about names - you can choose to keep a name due to an
attachment while also honoring the origin of the name. This is why I'm just
adding more onto my name instead of removing any bit of the name that my
parents gave me. (My nickname is longer than my real name, even. My real name
is a little too short.)

Ultimately it's a personal decision, and ultimately, like you point out, it's
a matter of basic respect to respect someone's choice of name and name
pronunciation. Nothing about a choice to be attached to something means that
you're stuck "telling stories" and that you're forever doomed to be attracted
to the symbol and not the substance.

I am actually quite saddened by the idea of someone living such a life.
"Robotic" is kind of an understatement.

~~~
PeterGriffin
No I'm actually impressed you designed your own rings. In another setting that
would certainly be worth a nice conversation over lunch or dinner with you and
your husband.

Maybe my reaction is... _beyond understanding_... (cue in spooky music).

Also don't confuse "robotic" with my lack of focus on stupid things. I laugh,
cry, hate and love a lot too. I can't understand why I need to be a stupid son
of a bitch getting hung up on how people pronounce my name or getting overly
attached to small shiny commercial objects, in order to do those things.

I also don't believe in witches and black magic. Oh, how robotic.

~~~
silencio
Okay I admit I was surprised ;) I figured that wouldn't be enough of a maker
story. We only did it because we were bored by all the identical unsuitable
rings we encountered. If we were going to stick with one symbol for our lives,
may as well be exactly what we wanted instead of settling.

The robotic part, I suppose, is a combination of your personal feelings on the
matter while refusing to see why it may be a problem for others. Not having an
attachment to your name by itself is a personal choice I can respect.

BTW if it's of any interest, my first name is Jane. My nickname is Janey. My
longer than my full name nickname is "janeylicious". Funny how nobody fucks up
the last one (except maybe the spelling) but I have so much trouble with my
plain first name to the point that I occasionally just make up a different
name or rely only on the nicknames. The plain name stuff can backfire ;)

------
TheLoneWolfling
I actually like that my name is hard to pronounce (as in: I have yet to hear
someone pronounce it correctly without being told). It means that I instantly
know when the person on the phone doesn't know me.

------
xienze
Mispronouncing someone's name is understandable. What gets me is people
misspelling my name... after they've worked with me for years... and seen my
name hundreds of times...

~~~
x1798DE
I'm even very forgiving of this. In America, I feel like every name has a few
different variants, especially anything that had to be transliterated from
another character set (even the German name Müller comes through sometimes as
Mueller and sometimes as Muller). Because they're so often some Anglicized
version of some foreign name, it's hard to have an intuition about the right
way to spell many names - even something simple like Goldman vs. Goldmann,
Green vs. Greene. I imagine that most people store a name in their brain as
how they pronounce it, plus some hint about the spelling if they've been
burned before ("Hmm... I remember there's a silent j in there somewhere, but
where...").

Names are tough in our wonderful melting pot, but it's a small price to pay
for having every kind of ethnic food available in all our major cities (and in
many of our minor ones).

~~~
xienze
Well, in my case, my first name is fairly common, it just has a letter
repeated that normally isn't. So, it's not some unusual, foreign name.

~~~
x1798DE
Well, even common names have many variants floating around, that's the point.
I tend to cut people slack on things like names given that I can never
remember how to spell things like commitment (two ms? two ts? both?!) without
a spellchecker getting my back.

------
Jemaclus
I once went to church with a friend of mine for six weeks, because he was shy
and didn't want to go to church by himself. We get there, and this woman walks
up to me.

Her: "What's your name?

Me: "Brian"

Her: "Brett! Nice to meet you, Brett. What's your last name, Brett?"

Me: "(my last name)"

Her: "Well, it is SO nice to meet you, Brett Psycho."

I was too flabbergasted to respond properly. Even worse, we had the exact same
conversation each week for the next six weeks. She couldn't even be bothered
to remember my discombobulated name.

------
lomnakkus
Hah! I have a name which I have literally _never_ heard a non-native speaker
(of my first language) pronounce correctly.

As far as I understand it, the problem isn't so much that people haven't heard
you pronounce your own name, it's more to do with the fact(?) that -- unless
they've been raised in a similar "sound-environment" \-- they literally cannot
_hear_ the subtleties of the pronunciation (e.g. tongue/lip positioning,
etc.). I've had this experience (in reverse) when trying to pronounce Chinese
and Arabic which have subleties which are very foreign to my native language.

------
dctoedt
About a year ago (or so), I added a parenthetical, _(My last name is
pronounced "Tate")_, to my business cards and email sig block. I've had
several people comment approvingly.

That said, I do wish my German ancestors had changed either the spelling or
the pronunciation when they came to the U.S. in the 19th century. I didn't do
it myself when I was younger for fear of family disapproval, and by now my
professional "brand" is under the existing spelling. Interestingly, my son,
who's just starting his career, brushes off my suggestion that he change the
spelling.

~~~
philwelch
Toedt (Tödt?), if my German pronunciation is correct, isn't exactly "Tate"
either. But it's close enough for English.

------
mariocesar
How HN users will pronounce my full name: Mario César Señoranis ?

Some suggest that this feels pretentious to suggest the correct pronunciation,
however I always research the correct pronunciation for all persons I'm
presented. From my side I like it, is a courtesy, is about good manners.

Not getting mad about someone mispronounce your name is courteous as research
the correct pronunciation for others name

------
jib
I mispronounce my own name most of the time. When I'm speaking English (which
is 99% of the time I guess) I just use the English pronounciation, because it
is easier, and who cares, really?

~~~
MatthewWilkes
I used to do this when living abroad. I always liked it, it reminded me of how
arbitrary names and borders are whenever I used it.

------
strozykowski
As a bearer of an apparently hard-to-pronounce name, this looks interesting,
but I don't know that I would do this.

~~~
JoshTriplett
If it's the same name as your HN username, I don't see any obvious way to
mispronounce it, other than whether the first 'o' is long or short. Is that
the bit people mispronounce?

~~~
Kluny
I'm guessing any pronunciation errors are caused by people misreading it and
skipping letters or adding extra ones.

~~~
strozykowski
This is pretty close to what happens. It's generally phonetic, and yet there
seems to be a wide variety of first pronunciations, which deviate from the
phonetic by several syllables either way.

------
sophacles
One thing this solves is the pronunciation of odd spellings of names, and to
an extent, names that are foreign to the recipient (e.g. to an anglophone many
eastern European and Asian names don't have an immediately decipherable
pronunciation from spelling).

However, one of the problems it doesn't help with, is that different languages
and language families have sounds that are not used in other languages. This
means people will still get your name wrong, because they don't necessarily
know how to make those sounds, nor do they even know how to hear the subtle
distinctions - e.g. the classic r/l confusion, or my own inability to get
tones right when trying to learn mandarin words/phrases.

I guess what I'm saying is I don't think anyone should expect this to suddenly
make everyone pronounce their name perfectly all of a sudden.

~~~
taejo
People with such names might adapt them to be pronounceable (I do: my name has
an English vowel which doesn't exist in German, and I introduce myself with a
German approximation when I'm speaking German). But even the pronounceable
version might not have an obvious correspondence with the written name. For
example Nguyen might be happy being called [wɪn] rather than [ŋʷĩəŋ], but many
English speakers will say something like ['guyɪn].

------
andremat
Remembers me of "How do you pronounce 'Bjarne Stroustrup?'":
[http://www.stroustrup.com/pronounciation.wav](http://www.stroustrup.com/pronounciation.wav)

~~~
commandar
"Hello, this is Linus Torvalds, and I pronounce Linux as Linux."

~~~
ternaryoperator
"Hello, this is Richard Stallman and I pronounce Linux as GNU/Linux."

------
timsayshey
Nice, reminds me of a Brian Regan sketch
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQ8BoYEgy1I&t=4m11s](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQ8BoYEgy1I&t=4m11s)

------
a3_nm
I agree that it is strange that we always provide the written form of a name
although you cannot unambiguously determine its pronunciation from it
(classical take on this:
[http://youtu.be/tyQvjKqXA0Y#t=0m19](http://youtu.be/tyQvjKqXA0Y#t=0m19)).
Still, it sounds a bit over the top to have a service dedicated to the purpose
of giving links to pronunciations of names.

I just provide the IPA for my name on my website, based on the unrealistic
assumption that people who need to will read it.

------
quarterwave
Several languages use compound nouns, proper and common. These cause
pronunciation problems when the phrase is read atomically, instead of by
parsing. For example, German armbunduhr is easily understood as arm+bund+uhr =
clock around arm, or wrist watch. Since I speak languages that also build up
compound nouns (e.g; chair = four+legs), I have no trouble recognizing the
need to parse in other languages.

~~~
koesterd
It's Armbanduhr, though. So it's more like Armband (wristband) and Uhr
(clock). But your solution is at least equally clever! I never thought of
that.

------
kyro
Pretty clever idea. My 4-letter nickname, Kyro, gets mispronounced 10 out of
10 times. It's pronounced kero, like hero, but most pronounce it kairo. At
first it was irritating, but I later realized it was a great conversation
starter. "Kairo, where are you from?" "Egypt" "Haha, like Cairo! Have you
been?"

Happy it worked out that way...

------
vitoreiji
It's remarkable that I still don't know if I should pronounce "names" or
"name-zee".

~~~
jmillikin
I assume it's nah-mez, rhyming with the name Ramez.

------
golden_apples
This is a really nice idea. I was working on a similar project a few years,
audioname.com. The trick is in networking with larger social service and
building integrations so that people can share their name's pronunciation
everywhere that their name is shared, which is unfortunately fragmented across
the web at the moment.

It would be nice to be able to highlight a name, search for it in this
database, and play an audio file from a browser extension, for example. Or
from an email client, or a linkedin profile, or wherever. Having to visit this
site to look up a name is enough of a barrier that once the novelty wears off,
I can't see it being too well used.

------
ludamad
I'm noticing some incorrect pronunciations here searching Polish names. At
least one Englishy 'W' and some that sound lot more bizarre than they should
due to recording issues. Any way to flag these?

------
gsharma
Here is something similar, but it uses text rather than voice and only has
Indian names so far.
[http://www.howdoyousaythatagain.com/](http://www.howdoyousaythatagain.com/)

------
momodomo
Sounds like a good way to solve a corner case in speech recognition: speech to
text for names. In reverse, it could also improve speech synthesis for
personal robots that would speak the names of their users.

------
pessimizer
I've liked the way some people have mispronounced my name. Answering to a
mispronounced name feels like wearing a wig to me; it's fun, and it makes me
feel more exotic than I am.

------
smackfu
I have an Irish "Mc" prefix name. There's a 50/50 chance someone will
pronounce it with the wrong stress, and there is no "correct" way. Just
tradition. So that's fun. I don't think this service would help though, since
people think they know how to pronounce it.

[http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/73900/when-
does-t...](http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/73900/when-does-the-
name-prefix-mc-take-stress)

------
joesmo
This assumes that, given the right pronunciation, people will be able to
pronounce your name correctly. That's just not reality. I've corrected many a
person many a time only to have them repeat the same pronunciation back to me
as they did before I corrected them two seconds ago. Finally, I just gave up.

Now I have two first names.

EDIT: Also happens a lot on voicemails, seconds after they've clearly heard my
first name pronounced (the last name I don't mind much as it is unusual).

------
arafalov
I had that as an idea for podcasts. Similar, but different I guess and now the
podcasts are mostly gone. [http://blog.outerthoughts.com/2011/06/say-your-
name-idea-for...](http://blog.outerthoughts.com/2011/06/say-your-name-idea-
for-podcasters/)

Article also links to couple of previous services doing similar things (back
then). Let's hope this one is more successful.

------
AdamGrey
Like everything, this will take a bit of time. Recording your name, attaching
to your email signature and allowing people to hear it a few times, in their
own comfort and on their own time, will help them to get it eventually. Once
everyone will have their name recorded, it will raise the issue and get people
to make an effort and realize it is important. Now, there is only nothing,
so...

------
ibrad
My name is simple enough to be pronounced by anyone, at least that's what I
thought. Then I realize in the US people had a hardtime remembering it because
for them it is unusual.

Now I try to pronounce it the American way just so my name isn't the center of
the conversation. I get surprised when I make a mistake and tell someone the
correct way of pronouncing it and they get right the first time.

------
stefanu
There is one advantage in people mispronouncing your name though. In my
experience, people within a group tend to converge towards one pronunciation
or variation of your name. On a random encounter in public or out-of-the group
environment, if someone is addressing you, you know which group he/she is
from, based on the pronunciation he/she used.

------
jakub_g
Orthogonal note: when in doubt how to pronounce someone's name, you can use
IVONA Text-to-Speech [1] if you know the origin, or Google Translate for
pronunciation (GT often can infer the language but this can be misleading).

[1] [http://www.ivona.com/en/](http://www.ivona.com/en/)

------
Udo
It's impossible for an English speaker to pronounce my last name, whether they
heard it before or not. Heck, I can't even pronounce it myself without falling
back into German speech mode.

But what's more important: it really doesn't matter to me how you pronounce
it. Do people care about it that much?

------
onedognight
This reminds me of the old recording from Linus[0].

> "Hello, this is Linus Torvalds, and I pronounce Linux as Linux!"

Does he still pronounce it this way?

[0] [http://www.paul.sladen.org/pronunciation/torvalds-says-
linux...](http://www.paul.sladen.org/pronunciation/torvalds-says-linux.wav)

------
krupan
I looked at the Croatian soccer team (since I lived there for a while and
speak a bit of the language) and I was disappointed you have the Americanized
spellings for the names. For example, it's Ivan Perišić, not Ivan Perisic :-)

------
junto
Funnily enough, as per your example "Powell"; this is impossible for Germans
to get right. If you prenouce that the English way they would write it "Paul".

They would prenounce "Powell" as "Pohvel".

------
NoMoreNicksLeft
Names have power. Why would I want anyone to be able to summon me so easily?

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batmansbelt
Hilarious. I was wondering how to pronounce Dusan this morning and couldn't
find out on You Tube.

[http://namez.com/search?q=dusan](http://namez.com/search?q=dusan)

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HorizonXP
I will never expect anyone to pronounce my legal first name, Xitij.

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johngalt
Zih-tidge is my guess.

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HorizonXP
Close. Kshee-teej, where the 't' is a soft 't' sound, almost like in the word
'thumb'. Hard to explain since English doesn't make distinctions between how
consonants can sound.

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hluska
My last name looks hard to pronounce so I'd technically be their target, but
unfortunately, I'm not sure that I'd actually set this up. Cool idea though!!

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Walkman
This is just pure genius! I have been fighting with people for a long time
pronouncing my name. Now, I just put a signature and I'm done explaining!

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johngalt
Honestly this seems really pretentious.

My last name is almost impossible. Even people who know me tend to just
abbreviate it. Whenever I meet someone new who stumbles over my name. I just
smile and say 'Don't worry about it, I said it wrong the first time too.' Then
give the correct pronunciation. It's a good way to break the ice.

Conversely sending someone a link on how to correctly pronounce your name just
screams 'I'm impossible to get along with'.

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stevekemp
My wife changed her name on marriage at least partially because her surname
(Finnish) is hard to pronounce for random people here in the UK.

(She's a doctor so she'd has to introduce herself with it on a constant basis
to patients - "Hello I'm Dr. Xxxx" \- Now she has a surname that is easy to
pronounce and a forename people often get wrong.)

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lifeformed
I like this kind of project. Small in scope, quick to understand, attention-
getting. It seems like a fun thing to make.

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gravity13
War-hole, like holes. Andy War-hole.

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adnam
Despite this, I live in a country where my surname is impossible to pronounce
correctly.

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olive_
It is also good for learning pronunciations of names of the famous people. I
like it.

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nailer
Actual feedback: clicking the signature didn't make any noise on iPad.

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laurentoget
If you are that sensitive to people pronouncing your name correctly and your
name is not bob or chris, leaving the US is probably your best bet.

I certainly gave up long ago.

