With my email address displayed in the upper right column of every page of the Biking Bis website, I get frequent mail from readers.
Usually people offer compliments and suggestions or ask for coverage of their bike tours or websites. But lately, I've received a couple of emails regarding the sexual orientation of the Biking Bis blog.
Over the Christmas holidays, someone wrote:
“I'm um not sure how to say this… but your web site name: “Biking Bis” is confusing! I got several hits for this site before finally checking it out. It is excellent. I did not look at it earlier because I thought it was for Gays, Lesbians and Bisexuals, hence the title.
How about changing it to “Biking Biz” or even “Bike Business”? There are more bikers than gay people in the world, so hopefully your readership should go up. :)”
I'm always in favor of readership going up, but most bike tours I've done are don't ask, don't tell. Anyway, I forgot about the issue until last week when I received this email:
“What does Biking Bis mean?”
Right away I knew what that person was getting at. I responded:
Well, my name is Gene Bisbee and my nickname is Bis, as in Biz. My wife starting calling me Biking Bis years ago, so I thought I'd use that as the name of my blog. It would be pronounced Biking Bizzzz.
Over the years, I've occasionally been asked if it was perhaps Biking Bi's, as in bisexuals. Because of the confusion, I've been considering changing the name to Biking Bisbee, but that might cause confusion for people searching information about Bisbee, Arizona.
So, for the time being, it's just Biking Bis.
I received this answer:
Thanks for the clarification. Yes, I thought it might be a biking group for bisexuals, which I am not! Anyway, it's a great website – Maybe it could be Biking Biz or Biking Bizz, but it might be more trouble than it's worth…probably a big pain. Anyway, I was just curious and thought I would ask.
Those are both good suggestions, but I don't know if it's worth the cost or risk of dropping out of sight on the search engines to change the name of the blog.
When I turned 60 a few weeks ago, I could have legitimately changed the name to “Biking Biz, the Cycling Sextagenarian”, but that might have been miscontrued too.
So for now, it's still Biking Bis.
(PS: This post marks the first time an emoticon has ever been used on the Biking Bis blog in more than five years.)
(PPS: That photo of me while eating was taken by my jokester son on a Ride Around Washington bike tour about 6 years ago.)
Recent Comments