I think the point Big Mick is making ties in with the distinction I made between a name you learn from somone who has lived with it, and one you get out of a book. The way words and names are pronounced changes, otherwise most people in Western Europe would still be speaking Latin. Respecting living tradition means respecting changes.

But that's a very diffeent thing from picking a name out of print and not having the curiosity of manners to find out what it sounds like where it's in common use.

The business of men's names being taken over by women is another issue entirely. Names like Joyce, Shirley, Evelyn and even Robin. Myself, I don't like it, but it's been going on long enough, and there's not much to be done about it. I know a Ciaran who on occasion has found that at an interview it turns out they'd been expecting a woman along. (It never seems to happen the other way round, with women's names becoming men's names.)