Name your baby Gamescom to give it the best start in life

Gamescom, taking place in Cologne this week, is the world's largest video games trade show, boasting more than 345,000 visitors and 700 exhibitors last year. It's a major event in the games industry calendar, a chance for gamers to play hundreds of releases ahead of time.

Also, apparently "Gamescom" is what you should call your baby.

Baby Gamescom will follow a methodical path to its goals

"Its meaning is connected to stability, safety, construction, method and rooting," according to Meaningaz.com, which ascribes meaning to names using numerology. Little baby Gamescom has a birth path of four, suggesting it will spend its life "patiently following a methodical path towards selected goals" — goals like organizing and maintaining a huge industry trade show, perhaps. But it won't all be sunshine, lollipops, and event planning for baby Gamescom. The poor kid will also have to "resolve important questions about the stability, commitment, patience, and clarity of mind." These are queries that will also presumably be joined by the burning question "why the shit did my parents name me after a four-day video gaming event in Germany?"

The site says it offers "unique and popular" baby name ideas, two claims that seem to be at odds with each other. "Gamescom" as a name certainly isn't unique (see the aforementioned huge trade show), suggesting it must instead be popular, already bestowed upon the youth of today. German readers, maybe you can answer this: are your cities and towns full of youthful Gamescoms? Are your schools groaning with sensible and stable children named after video game events, each more methodical than the last? Do you ask your friends "are you going to Gamescom?" only for five children to pipe up with a querying "ja?"

There must be some benefit for these baby Gamescoms — free entry to their namesake shows, perhaps, or at the very least a small SEO bump once a year. But with Gamescom already underway, why not get the jump on the competition and call your child "CES" instead? According to the same site, CES is "endowed with a charisma that can lead others," and "connected to universal wisdom and integrity." Which is weird, because I always thought CES was mainly connected to ostentatious casino resorts, gratuitous expense, and miles upon miles of horrifically patterned convention center carpet.