Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

There's a story (whose veracity I have not verified) that some of the stranger dutch surnames are because when some older occupying power (the spanish? Napoleon?) came in and immediately took a census, farmers gave in joke names, little thinking their descendants would still be known, and catalogued, by them.

"En we noemen hem Robbert Gegevenstabeltje"



How does that relate to my question?


It doesn't answer your question, but it relates another instance in which the dutch (at least supposedly) actively illegibilised themselves under the shadow of external data-gathering.




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: