[amsat-bb] Re: OSCAR - Acronym for...?

[George Henry]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "James Whitfield" <n5gui at cox.net>
To: <amsat-bb at amsat.org>
Sent: Tuesday, August 05, 2008 4:05 PM
Subject: [amsat-bb] Re: OSCAR - Acronym for...?


[snip]
> I have had a moderately long technical career, occasionally punctuated by
> what I now view as futile attempts to get co-workers, most of whom were
> supposedly well educated, to understand the meaning of the term "acronym".
> The difficult, and most frustrating, part is in trying to communicate what
> an acronym is not.  COBOL is an acronym, but IBM and BLT are not.  ( Since
> most of the time I have tried to point out the distinction, the reaction
> that I got was "serious don't care". )
>
[snip]


IBM and BLT are actually "initialisms"....  distinguished from an "acronym" 
by virtue of not being pronounceable like COBOL, OSCAR, SNAFU, etc.


73,

George, KA3HSW