Kaylan Lindsay doesn't have children and she isn't pregnant.
But every day, the 21-year-old Toronto actor signs in to BabyNamesWorld.com and talks to parents-to-be about what to call their little bundles of joy, sometimes spending hours researching etymology, answering questions and suggesting, for example, the classic Adele instead of the trendy Addison.
"It's something that's fun and fascinating for me. A name is forever," explains Ms. Lindsay, who started requesting baby name books for Christmas when she was 13. "To know that I helped someone make that important decision, it makes me really happy and proud."
Ms. Lindsay, who volunteers her services online, is one of a growing number of onomastics enthusiasts catering to a generation of parents hungry for the perfect name. In the old days, people looked to their family trees and the Bible for names. In the 1960s and 1970s, parents turned to popular culture and baby books for inspiration - and a legion of Jennifers, Amys and Kimberleys were born.
Now the potential name pool has gone global, and parents want something truly different. They scour the Internet searching for the next Ava and Aidan (which have already become too popular for name-watchers' tastes).
"There's been a general cultural move toward individuality," says Laura Wattenberg, author of The Baby Name Wizard."Parents don't want to have the No. 1 name - even though kids are perfectly happy to fit in and have a popular name."
With North American parents having fewer children and having them later in life, finding the perfect name has become a status quest for some, Ms. Wattenberg notes.
"Some parents almost treat it like a brand decision," she says. "It's as if you're launching a little product out into the world."
And just like corporate branding, a host of experts and web sites have sprung up to cater to the demand for better baby names.
BabyNamesWorld.com started with 10 name advisers in 2003 and now has 42; the number of registered users has doubled in the past nine months to 41,750; and demand for the free name advice service has grown 75 per cent in the past year, according to site administrator Anabel Connor.
Shauna Magill at Our Baby's Name offers name suggestions and reviews for $24.95 (U.S.), or $99.95 for a 30-minute consulting session. Based in Australia, she says she serves about 20 clients a month from around the world.
"North American customers are looking for names that are edgy, but not too far off the beaten track," Ms. Magill says. "Australians seek names that express their individuality and creativity, caring less about meaning and family tradition. Spanish-speaking customers tend to have deeper ties to their family traditions as well as their religious preferences."
The world of name enthusiasts is not a gentle, baby-powder-scented place.
A quick dip into the online pool reveals a number of bitter controversies: debates over boys' names for girls (James, Mason); last names as first names (Kennedy, McKinley); creative spellings and made-up names (Makayla, Nevaeh).
On the forums on BigBadBabyNames.net, critics peruse online birth announcements and bemoan the "kree8tive" name spellings dreamed up by "tryndy mommeighs."
Ms. Connor recently helped talk one mother out of naming her baby Circle. Just imagine the kindergarten trauma when little Circle's class starts learning about geometric shapes, Ms. Connor told the mother. Most parents take constructive advice well, she says - they come to the site asking for it - but some fly into an all-caps rage.
"People really, really take offence if you don't like something they like," she says.
The strongest hostility simmers between what Ms. Wattenberg calls the modern creatives and the traditionalists.
The former like newly minted names such as Braeden and Ryleigh, while the latter prefer classics such as Henry and Isabella.
"It's a big cultural divide," Ms. Wattenberg says. "Each side looks at the other and they just don't get it."
