Talk:Backronym/Archive 4

On 5 March 2011 an editor at IP address 63.231.155.204 added SOS, calling it "Among the most famous backronyms" alleged to stand for "Save Our Ship" or "Save Our Souls", but in fact "originally meaningless letters." This certainly does seem significant, but we need some source to that effect. (I have always believed that it does stand for Save Our Ship, but I may well be wrong.) Cnilep (talk) 13:03, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

A similar assertion is made at SOS, but it is marked as {{Citation needed}}. Cnilep (talk) 13:08, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

I would support the IP, in that "three" of things is a universal distress symbol, so using ...---... in Morse (or is it ---...---?) - not a word, and easily repeatable, is less likely to be an acronym, but lends itself strongly to backronyming. Huw Powell (talk) 03:39, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

"SOS" is "... --- ..." Easily remembered, three groups of three (the distress number).

"CQ" is "-.-. --.-" The discussion here seems a stretch. I always assumed "CQ CQ CQ" was simply short for the english "Seek-you" - broadcast while fishing for contact from anyone -- but I'm no authority. HalFonts (talk) 01:43, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

This is explained under CQD. One thing about SOS is that 'S' in morse is coincidentally much like the ellipsis(recursive, which can help break through noise), but that's serendipitous. Maybe there's some use for a new word such as: serendipronyn ,take POST for example, where the resulting (supposed backronym) forms a word much akin to ,in this case, service desk terminal. SignedJohnsonL623 (talk) 01:18, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

CQ was used to alert all stations (all receiving parties) to pay attention to the following message. D was added to indicate that the message was a Distress call, so CQD indicated a general call for immediate assistance. In the early 1900s, as wireless (radio) began to become more common, an international committee decided to use SOS in place of CQD, since its format of ... --- ... could easily be recognized, even by amateurs. Save Our Ship/Souls is indeed a backronym, though I would say a useful one, if it helps people to remember SOS. I added a pair of citations to the article, and struck the dubious tag. --Badger151 (talk) 00:09, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

Germany had SOE as a general call, SOS was chosen internationally because a trailing E as one dot (.) could easily be lost in noise. I've cited http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/7444184.stm for the history of SOS. K7L (talk) 02:32, 7 October 2012 (UTC)

I've put the overbar back, so SOS and not SOS. There is a difference, the bar indicates prosigns in Morse code which are sent as a single character, so ...---... and not ...   ---   ... K7L (talk) 17:33, 4 March 2013 (UTC)

There has been a consensus to limit the number of examples on this page. At the same time, though, editors periodically suggest additional examples that may improve the page. Please discuss any new examples here and add them to the page only if there is agreement among multiple editors, and a reliable source for the addition. Cnilep (talk) 21:31, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

• Similarly, Apple's 1983 Lisa computer is officially said to be an acronym for "Local Integrated Software Architecture", however Lisa was the internal code name, and only became the official name when third-party name consultants were unable to come up with anything better. Pundits responded by saying Lisa stood for "Let’s Invent Some Acronym."<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.tech-seeker.com/blog/apple-lisa/|title=Apple Lisa|accessdate=2011-03-17}}</ref>

Added by IP 216.239.45.4 on 17 March 2011. Cnilep (talk) 21:31, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

I notice that, in addition to being a self-published blog and therefore less reliable, the cited source shows signs of being scraped from a Wiki, perhaps Wikipedia (e.g. there are "Main article" notices, which don't actually link to anything). Therefore, I don't think we can consider it an appropriate source. Cnilep (talk) 21:37, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

• The 107th United States Congress deliberately named its main response to the terrorist attacks of September 11th the "Uniting (and) Strengthening America (by) Providing Appropriate Tools Required (to) Intercept (and) Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001", or USA PATRIOT Act.

Added by User:DavidForthoffer 27 March 2012 with edit summary, "Added USA PATRIOT Act as example". Cnilep (talk) 10:20, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

• CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 is another of these ("Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography And Marketing Act of 2003") as explained in that law's article.

• MCSE, one of the Microsoft Certified Professional vendor qualifications, was originally "Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer" (although there were various humorous backronyms.) Regulatory bodies including the Ordre des Ingénieurs du Québec and Canadian Council of Professional Engineers objected that "engineer" as a profession is a legally-reserved status under various Canadian provincial laws. The MS designation is now "Microsoft Certified Solutions Expert".

• WKBW-TV is redefined with "That is the motivation that I needed! Right there! Thank you. Thank you, W.K.B.W.! Wimpy Kitty Baby Whiners! That's what that stands for! I'll see you on channel 5, where they do the real news." by the lead character in Bruce Almighty at 00:05:20 transcript. No idea why this was removed, as it is easily sourced to the film itself. K7L (talk) 17:41, 4 March 2013 (UTC)

• "Canadian Broadcorping Castration" for Canadian Broadcasting Corporation#Nicknames, created by American radio producer Kermit Schaefer for one of the "Pardon My Blooper" record albums.

• NTSC as "never twice the same colour" is sourced by a stack of books. The NTSC standard has been a joke for years, broadcast textbooks make that more than clear. There is no excuse for its removal here. K7L (talk) 17:56, 4 March 2013 (UTC)

• RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act) bears the name of a 1930 Little Caesar (film) gangster; the law's author has coyly refused to confirm nor deny the allusion to be a willful naming of a legislative act for the cinema character.(snopes) K7L (talk) 14:53, 13 June 2013 (UTC)

• Yet another example is an urban legend that golf stands for "gentlemen only, ladies forbidden."<ref>http://www.snopes.com/language/acronyms/golf.asp</ref> However, when the word began to first appear, acronyms simply were not used. Suggested by 70.248.74.17, with citation and clean-up thanks to K7L. Cnilep (talk) 03:51, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

• Can we add Standard American Diet (S.A.D.) as an example? I'm not sure if it qualifies, but there are plenty of uses out in the wild on blogs and Facebook groups and such. I'm not too familiar with wikipedia so I don't know if those places on the web have any value in this context. Bryan (talk) 00:33, 8 May 2014 (UTC)

• POODLE I would like to suggest POODLE (Padding Oracle On Downgraded Legacy Emulation) to the page. It is significant because backronyms are specifically starting to be used in order to increase public visibility into security vulnerabilities. Indeed, we have seen equal calls for service on our equipment for Heartbleed, Shellshock, and POODLE, despite POODLE being a far less severe vulnerability. Article in SC Magazine: "Heartbleed, Shellshock, and POODLE: The Sky Is Not Falling" Schlice (talk) 17:14, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

• I've started hearing people recently saying that META when used in a gaming sense stands for "most efficient tactic available" when meta clearly comes from an old Greek word. I think if anyone were to be bored and grab a few sources, it would make an excellent modern addition to the list of examples. Any thoughts? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.8.237.93 (talk) 08:32, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Come on, no one ever uses this silly spelling. Or do they? Huw Powell (talk) 03:31, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Oh, never mind, I see, it was the first usage. But still. Huw Powell (talk) 03:36, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Within the article itself, the usage should be consistent - and is not. Keep both in the intro, then stick with "backronym" instead of alternating randomly. K7L (talk) 17:26, 4 March 2013 (UTC)

On two occasions editor(s) from two IP addresses have added suggestions that British Petroleum changed its name to BP and then to Beyond Petroleum "to distance itself from the term ‘British’ in the international markets" (19 April 2011) or "[to] mask their identity" (21 April 2011). These are controversial suggestions for which no sources were cited.

In addition, the company is currently called BP and not Beyond Petroleum. This appears to be an Orphan initialism rather than a backronym.

Finally, it is not the goal of this page to list every apparent backronym. Examples are meant to illustrate and help readers understand the concept, not to document cases exhaustively.

I have therefore rolled back the addition, and will continue to do so unless consensus emerges from a discussion here to add it. Cnilep (talk) 03:27, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

I half typed out a wanderous rant here, before deciding that it was not the appropriate forum. Is there any reference for BP standing for anything beyond the BP-Amoco merger? Crispmuncher (talk) 08:00, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

Maybe there is a recursive acronym /backronym specifically for the internet or wikis. Such as IE(IE), what might be called: 'serendiponym' internet mnemonic. Another of this specific type might be RR (Rolls Royce founders link separately from each R) rather than the usual RR.SignedJohnsonL623 (talk) 06:09, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

A possible candidate for this style of recursive acronym internet mnemonic is: IDEA. SignedJohnsonL623 (talk) 06:32, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

I'd suspect that "beyond petroleum" is an advertising slogan, not a company name. Nonetheless, the repeated removals of content from this article are getting annoying; did anyone try to actually find a source? K7L (talk) 17:28, 4 March 2013 (UTC)

Would an editor please consider adding my non-commercial backronym (and mnemonic/acrostic poem) creation website http://www.joglab.com or the page: http://www.joglab.com/AcrosticPoemsAndBackronyms.htm to the external links section for this article? Wovenone (talk) 23:05, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

At this point ,this form of acronym hyperlink seems quite limited, but may find application. Remembering that,The whole is more than the sum of its parts, if BLT becomes BLT then that's getting into genetic fallacy, because most would understand BLT to include bread etc. SignedJohnsonL623 (talk) 07:03, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

To keep more in the spirit of Wikipedia: the recursive 'wikinym' prime example could be IMNB, which has a sort of oblique reference to The Mezzanine, a book by Nicholson Baker. That is, the NB could stand for 'nota bene' or Nicholson Baker, who seems to have written some works on Wikipedia.SignedJohnsonL623 (talk) 07:40, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

It was been requested here by the (alleged) daughter of the creator of the word that it was originally spelled 'Bacronym' and as such the article title is wrong. I agree, but because the article has existed so long I am hesitant to move it without consensus. Of course, if no one has an opinion one way or another I'll move it and leave a redirect with the current spelling. --| Uncle Milty | talk | 10:53, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

The spelling 'bacronym' is indeed the earliest attested form, in the Washington Post attributed to Meredith G. Williams. Wordspy, the main source cited here, offers both spellings. The spelling 'backronym' with a k appears to be more commonly used, however. Although Google search estimates are not always reliable, a search for {bacronym -Wikipedia} finds about 25,000 pages, while {backronym -Wikipedia} finds about 158,000. I think both spellings should be included here, though I have no strong objection to moving the page to Bacronym and leaving Backronym as a redirect. Cnilep (talk) 13:04, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

I think you want to go with the more common, not the older, as the primary spelling. Otherwise, if you applied this principle universally, all entries would be in Old English, or the English of the era the word entered the language (or should I say ágenspræc). M Pinck (talk) 22:21, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Sometimes, the original meaning of an acronym becomes untrue, but the users of the acronym want to keep using it. At that point, a new meaning is devised for the existing acronym. Specifically I am thinking of DVDs, which went from "Digital Video Discs" to "Digital Versatile Discs" (before coming to stand for nothing at all). More recently I read about the WIDA Consortium, whose name originally stood for "WIsconsin Delaware Arkansas," but was changed to "World-class Instructional Design and Assessment" when other states joined. Is this a sub-type of backronym? Have any linguists or other writers described this phenomenon before? Fishal (talk) 05:38, 31 July 2012 (UTC)

See Orphan initialism. Cnilep (talk) 06:34, 31 July 2012 (UTC)

There's an old version of this page archived at www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/List-of-backronyms and http://meta.uncyclomedia.org/wiki/UnSource:List_of_acronyms#Reverse_etymology which had that information. Unfortunately, this article has been butchered with much pertinent info removed (it used to be two pages, backronym and list of backronyms). The orphan initialism isn't quite the same beast as it's an after the fact claim that the letters stand for nothing (for instance, CBS Television Network instead of Columbia Broadcasting System) and not an attempt to fit new words to old abbreviations (like "digital versatile disc"). K7L (talk) 02:35, 7 October 2012 (UTC)

This edit by K7L – building on an earlier addition by Dhaluza – expands the definition to an acronym that "fits an existing word or acronym". None of the currently cited sources included the "or acronym" bit as far as I can see, though. Paul McFedries defines bacronym [sic] as "A reverse acronym: a regular word that also doubles as an acronym." Meredith Williams' original definition simply had it as "same as an acronym, except that the words were chosen to fit the letters", but the examples in that original Washington Post piece were words rather than older acronyms. The other sources cited on this page verify particular replacements, and do not define "backronym" as such.

K7L says that examples such as ETOPS are not orphan initialisms, and should be considered backronyms. (I note, by the way, that Acronym no longer uses "orphan initialism"; it calls re-jiggered ancronyms "Pseudo-acronyms", but cites the Language Log blog entry, "Orphan initialisms". That article also refers to "Simple redefining" of acronyms.) Wikipedia policy does not support refining the explanations given in published material, though. Articles should stick to what reliable sources actually say. That means that even if several Wikipedians think that "backronym" better describes WIDA or ETOPS, adding them without citing sources outside of Wikipedia is problematic. Similarly, redefining "backronym" without such sources is problematic. Cnilep (talk) 04:28, 24 March 2014 (UTC)

I would question whether ETOPS is even a backronym, as nobody uses it seriously. It's an aviation in-joke, pure and simple: much like the "fact" that USAir means "Unfortunately Still Allegheny In Reality" or Ford stands for "Found On Road Dead." I should note that ETOPS replaced an earlier program called EROPS (Extended Range OPerationS), which had the joke backronym "Engines Run Or Passengers Swim." 71.171.100.105 (talk) 18:51, 30 April 2015 (UTC)

I don't mean to get the argument going again, but I am truly not understanding the problem with calling backronym a portmanteau. It's not as if we're looking at a coupe and trying to say it's a sedan or vice versa. It is just so blinkin' obvious that it is, in fact, a portmanteau. At least, according to Wikipedia's own article on the subject, it is.

Personally, I think it's a massive hair-splitting exercise, but if it's really that big a deal, then someone needs to take a look at phablet as well. Or is phablet a real portmanteau while backronym isn't?.

Maybe there's an official list somewhere to which one must refer before labeling a word?

If it walks like a duck, etc.

--Mfwills (talk) 18:22, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Did you check the arguments from before? As you say, that hair needn't be split again.

But your comment made me check the article and realize that the introductory sentence incorrectly called backronym a "phrase", which requires more than one word. Yet virtually all, or maybe entirely all, backronyms are single words. So I changed that. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 21:23, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

The problem is not with nature of the word backronym so much as with the word portmanteau itself. Some Wikipedia editors seem to really love that word, and want to add it where ever it may be applicable. Some editors seem to really hate it and want to remove it where ever there may be a question about its propriety. The whole issue is, in my opinion, best avoided. Cnilep (talk) 01:56, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Avoiding this issue may be counter productive (the reason being, many readers would totally miss a useful reference that is much relavent to this word; regardless of the decision to use it in the article or not, the debate itself makes it atleast relavent). I find it silly to exclude demanding citations for it so I made an attempt to add it as it is an obvious internal reference. I think an RFC should be started and this issue should be dealt with. --lTopGunl (talk) 01:46, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

Given the breadth of the disagreement, WP:Village Pump (policy) may be a better venue. If it were possible to resolve this disagreement, that resolution would effect the MOS as well as dozens of articles. I anticipate, though, that any such debate will come to a similar end as the Village Pump discussion of initialism: both sides dig in, and no consensus is reached. Cnilep (talk) 02:07, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

I assume the issue here on this article is specifically being objected too. The village pump debate seems to span the much wider contention. --lTopGunl (talk) 02:18, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

Regardless of your position on the use of portmanteau in general, "backronymn" is not one because it uses the entire word "back" rather than a portion of the word. To quote from portmanteau:

Portmanteaux should also be distinguished from compounds, which do not involve the truncation of parts of the stems of the words making them up. For instance, starfish is a compound, not a portmanteau, of star and fish (a hypothetical portmanteau of these words might be *stish).

- DavidWBrooks (talk) 20:34, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

Back is being truncated from its complete word here in context ('backward') but since it is still a word (although a different one) and we choose to neglect to consider that as 'truncation', above is still not entirely true because it does truncate the word 'acronym' in the second part. A further explanation in article could be added perhaps that explains this partiality as well (if this is really an issue). This fact doesn't kill the debate. --lTopGunl (talk) 23:45, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

True: nothing will kill the debate. The smoking ruins of post-apocalyptic Earth will feature cockroaches, Twinkies, and a host of silly wiki-edit wars. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 15:17, 7 October 2014 (UTC)

Apparently DavidWBrooks found a way to sidestep the eternal debate by changing "portmanteau" to "combination". I am a former participant in the edit war, and I support this change. Clement Cherlin (talk) 14:06, 15 May 2015 (UTC)

User:Reywas92 recently removed the suggestion that the restaurant "Arby's" is named for roast beef (RB), suggesting "roast beef is a bit of a backronym itself". The cited source, a news item from Slate.com, does say that the name is "of course" from roast beef. Reywas92 subsequently pointed to the restaurant's own FAQ which disagrees. "Close, but not quite. It comes from our founders, Leroy and Forrest Raffel, the Raffel Brothers, or 'RB.'" Since the point of including that example is not about RB but about the backronym "America's Roast Beef, Yes Sir", it may be best to leave out the disputed "roast beef" explanation. In that case, however, we will need to cite a source for America's Roast Beef, Yes Sir that does not make the RB≡roast beef claim, as Gross does. Cnilep (talk) 01:43, 2 July 2014 (UTC)

If RB="roast beef" is itself a backronym, we should list it and "America's roast beef..." with slate.com as the source of both backronyms, and the Arby's FAQ as the source for 'Raffel Brothers'. No need to remove valid content here. K7L (talk) 04:54, 2 July 2014 (UTC)

But the Slate article doesn't appear to be a valid reference; it just says "of course" and doesn't say how it knows this. We don't know that it IS valid content - that's why it was removed. Slate articles can be valid references - I just added one, by coincidence - but when they go against the primary sourcing we need something more than "of course". - DavidWBrooks (talk) 16:57, 2 July 2014 (UTC)

Shouldn't the "False Backronym" section be titled "False Acronym"? Based on the examples, it appears to be describing backronyms that were mistaken for acronyms. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.245.199.26 (talk) 03:07, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

It might not be either/or. "Posh" has been falsely thought to have been an acronym, therefore the "port out, starboard home" that it's to have been derived from can be called a "false" backronym as well, although it's legitimate from the standpoint of backronyms not needing official standing to be legitimate. Dhtwiki (talk) 16:37, 24 April 2015 (UTC)