:: When is an acronym not an acronym? ::
When it's a trademark! A recent blog entry by Jon Udell puzzled over why some acronyms don’t seem to stand for anything any more.
The answer is that US trademark laws prohibit acronyms being used as trademarks. So, what have some organisations done to circumvent this problem? They declare that the acronym in question doesn’t stand for anything at all, to which I reply YYSSW.
When teaching J2EE as part of a wireless architecture course, I frequently quiz the students about acronyms. I shall find it odd saying “What does JDBC stand for?”, knowing now, thanks to Jon, that it doesn’t stand for anything. I can see this issue has entertainment value – “Test! Which acronyms don’t stand for anything at all?”
Acronyms are used abundantly in technology circles. I still recall that one of the first documents handed to me when I joined Motorola, many years ago, was a list of acronyms. I joined Motorola (big US company) to work on GSM, which originally was a French acronym - Groupe Spécial Mobile. It later became Global System for Mobile communications. When awarding contracts for cellular systems in Iraq, some US senators objected to the use of GSM technology, because, in their mistaken view, it was horrible French technology. The perils of acronyms!
11:08:32 AM 
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