I’ve noticed that the SSA website, in the section where you can search for the chart history of a name, has some bugs. It seems several boy names dont appear when you write the name, unless you also select the “male”. For example, the name “[name_u]Santana[/name_u]” or “Ledger” don’t present any results, unless you click “male”, even though they’ve been charting for several years. It seems like none of the recent new boy additions from the past 3 or so years work, unless you add the “male” part.
Does anyone know how we can contact the SSA about this bug?
Welcome to Nameberry! So my thoughts on this are when you type in a name it either shows a pink bar graph showing the change in popularity or a blue one, assuming the sex of the child with that name. I typed in [name_u]River[/name_u], a unisex name, and it came up blue. I then clicked female to see the female [name_u]Rivers[/name_u]. I did the same test with [name_u]Taylor[/name_u] and it popped up with the female results first and then I selected male to see the male results.
I tried [name_u]Santana[/name_u] and got the message
“[name_u]Santana[/name_u] is not in the top 1000 names for any year of birth beginning with 2000.”
So I believe the reason you’re not seeing data on some names is because it only charts popularity over time for names within the top 1000. [name_f]Hope[/name_f] this helped!
You can use the same email address that I promoted to get them to release the lists - actuary (at) ssa (dot) gov (their actuary department oversees the baby name lists - the address is spaced out to keep this from being flagged as spam).
I’ve noticed this before too – frustrating! Is it something to do with when the name first joined the Top 1000? Like you say, it seems to happen more with more recent entrants.
Sorry, I realise this isn’t an answer but it’s not just you!
Except [name_u]Santana[/name_u] is in the top1000, and has been for several years. No boy names that have charted for the first time in the past 3 or 4 years give any results unless you put “male” on them.