Chinese couple try to name baby '@'

A Chinese couple have tried to name their baby "@", claiming the character used in email addresses echoes their love for the child.

The unusual name stands out especially in Chinese, which has no alphabet and instead uses tens of thousands of multi-stroke characters to represent words.

"The whole world uses it to write email and, translated into Chinese, it means 'love him'," the father explained.

While the "@" symbol is familiar to Chinese email users, they often use the English word "at" to sound it out -- which, with a drawn out "t", sounds something like "ai ta", or "love him", to Mandarin speakers.

Li did not say if officials accepted the "@" name.

Source: Zdnet