This blog may appear that I'm bashing Facebook.  That is not the case at all and I will report anything about similar sites such as Bebo and Faceparty when I see them in the press

This article is taken from a London paper called Metro on 13 July 2007 (written by Joel Taylor).

It bills itself as the 'social utility that connects you with people around you' but, if you happen to be called Gay, you might find that's not really the case.

More than 30 million people world wide have signed up to Facebook but it has emerged the website has banned the surname Gay - asking users to use a 'legitimate' name instead.

Metro spent several hours trying to find out wat names the networking site would and wouldn't allow.  It didn't like John Gay, despite there being 179 listed on the London electoral roll and more than 4,500 other Gays across Britain.

Ben Cock was also barred, even though 753 are listed nationwide.

And Elvis Presley was blocked, although at least 29 people share their name with the King.

Adolf Hitler and Mao Tse-tung were also not 'legitimate', although several Osama Bin Ladens exist on the website.  And some strange names are allowed too - Helen Smart A***, Chris Dogs B******* and John W***** are all acceptable.

Yannick Gay, from London, admitted you had to have 'a sense of humour' when born with the surname Gay, but thought it was unreasonable for the site to ban his name.

'I've never tried to use Facebook but I'd like to have the option to be able to', the 33-year-old said.  But he admitted if he did try to use it he would probably use a different surname.

'Not being gay, I don't want to be pestered, which can happen on the Internet through people misunderstanding,' he added.

Facebook was contacted yesterday but decided it had nothing to say.

----

Interesting article I would however, Facebook are not alone.  Google has a similar issue with their Google groups.  I recently tried to set up a Google group called "Web Analytics" however, its was denied because of a certain four letter word in the phrase hehe.... I had to settle for WebMetrics instead.