December 2, 2015

A Brief History Of People Supposedly Naming Their Kids After Instagram Filters

The idea of naming your kid after an Instagram filter is hot now because of some BabyCenter poll. But it is not new.

It was around last week. Did Becca's tweet broke BabyCenter's press release embargo?

Did Abby know 3+ weeks ago? Should you hire her as a millennial thinkfluencer to consult for your brand?

Or maybe she just OH'd the idea from Lindsey the week before:

uh-oh, shit just got real in August over in Nikita's timeline:

Before it was a momtrend, was Instagram-filter-babynaming the slutshaming of its day?

Oh crap, this whole pseudo-viral thing's been orchestrated by self-conscious selfie-taking ad execs and publicists:

But no, it's older than that, at least the idea is:

And so is the joke about naming the kid X-Pro II.

It often comes back to shade, though [which, tbh, is kind of a cool baby name]:

A lot of this in 2014 was directed at "lightskin women" or worse, "white girls":

The earliest tweet I could find about naming your kid after Instagram filters was from 2012. But despite the existence of Willow Smith, has anyone ever asked if maybe they aren't naming Instagram filters after kids instead?

Actually, in 2013, Mike Isaac did some actual reporting on where Instagram got its first batch of video filter names for the now-defunct tech blog AllThingsD. Stinson and Moon were both dogs of Instagram staffers; Vesper was a favorite cocktail, and the rest were the team's favorite Bay Area placenames. [Plus Brooklyn.]

In other words, Instagram staffers are pulling filter names out of the same cultural pot other plugged in millennials are getting their pet and baby names from: which makes me wonder if they have filters instead of kids.

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