User talk:Winelight

Acronyms, punctuation, and editing

Before you decide to act authoritatively and revert other people's edits, please be sure you know what you're talking about. (As for me, I've got a degree with honors in English education.) From one of countless references, the "Guide to Grammar and Writing":

"It appears that there are no hard and fast rules for using periods in either acronyms or abbreviations." [1]

Please do a little more research before using your opinions, and not facts, to change other people's work. Thanks. -- B.Rossow ^talk_contr 12:29, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Brossow, you are quite wrong on this point. --Winelight 13:17, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

• http://www.fluther.com/disc/43980/what-are-the-punctuation-rules-regarding-acronyms/ -- "It’s a matter of style[...]." ... "Grammatically speaking, you leave in the dots." ... "For well know acronyms, I think it is common to leave out the period, but certainly always correct to put it in."
• http://www.economicexpert.com/a/Acronym.htm -- "In the case of most acronyms and initialisms, each letter is its own abbreviation, and in theory should get its own period."

I could go on, but there's no point. I've already cited numerous sources and you're going to believe whatever you already believe. Bottom line is it's a stylistic choice, not a rule written in stone. Don't make changes just to suit your personal preferences. Feel free to have the final word on the subject. -- B.Rossow ^talk_contr 13:58, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't understand the first B.Rossow's comment (didn't have time to read the second one yet): if as the quote says there are no hard and fast rules for using periods in acronyms of abbreviations, then why do you authoritatively insist on them? That's just about as artbitrary as you seem to think Winelight's changes were...

What that quote indicates to me, is that if there are no hard and fast rules, then it might be better to follow the common usage, which is how it works in English. And common usage is Acronym (although personally I prefer ACRONYM - capitalized but without periods).

Furthermore, reading the quote in context, it says right afterwards: "More and more, newspapers and journals seem to drop the periods." Again, it indicates that it's now a very common practice to drop the periods.

To Winelight, could you please move the rest of your arguments here too, to keep all the discussion in one place? -- Camomiletea 14:06, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

The problem is that B.Rossow is confusing initialisms, abbreviations and acronyms. That's why you can't understand his comments - they don't make sense. Here is the Oxford Dictionary definition:

acronym

/akrnim/

• noun a word formed from the initial letters of other words (e.g. laser, Aids).

The point being that an acronym is a word. It's not an abbreviation, an initialism, or anything else - it's a word. And W.O.R.D.S are not generally capitalised with full stops between the letters. So I've corrected the error on the page for the Acronym.

That's the way it's been all along and I'm not a fan of change for the sake of change. More to the point, to change it to lowercase except for the initial capital is just plain wrong. Regardless of how you feel about periods in an acronym, you certainly wouldn't write "Nasa" or "Fbi". My initial reply simply refuted Winelight's claim (in the page's edit history) that "[a]n acronym is a word, and not a collection of capital letters with full stops" as his/her justification for changing it to something far less correct. It's really a moot point now, anyway. That's all I have to say on the subject. I'm not here to provide English lessons or to do others' research for them. -- B.Rossow ^talk_contr 15:14, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

FBI is not an acronym, it's an initialism. That's a false analogy. --Winelight 15:52, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Rest of argument moved here as requested:

There are at least the following arguments why it must be Acronym and not A.C.R.O.N.Y.M.

First, please note that we are talking about acronyms and not initialisms. They are two entirely different things and any reference you can find that talks about both cannot be relevant, since we are not talking about initialisms. Also, you selectively quoted from Wikipedia. Please go on to read the rest of that entry.

1. Consistency with English. Do people write "L.A.S.E.R." or Laser?

2. Internal consistency in the wiki. How many times is the Arconym trap mentioned in the wiki? Of these mentions, how many are "A.C.R.O.N.Y.M."?

3. Usage. With your educational background, I'm sure you know that the key to "correct" English is usage. Now, what do people actually say, (a) in the wiki (see 2. above) and (b) in the forums? Do they use "A.C.R.O.N.Y.M." or Acronym?

4. Try the Oxford dictionary definition of acronym. Remembering that we are talking about acronyms - not initialisms, which are an entirely different thing - an acronym is defined, in the Oxford dictionary as a word. Now, in English, do people generally put full stops after each letter in a word?

--Winelight 15:55, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I've also seen "ACRoNYM" widely used in the forum. Perhaps more so than "ACRONYM". --Winelight 15:59, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

The fact is, you keep insisting on changing the text to "Acronym", which is probably one of the worst of all the options. It seems to me that it would be most clear to use "A.C.R.O.N.Y.M." to be explicit about the abbreviation, or "ACRONYM" to distinguish this particular usage (referring to the trap) from the common noun acronym. I personally prefer the original version as it is historically how it has been presented, irrespective of what people choose to use in everyday conversation. The mentioning of the abbreviation in the main trap page is an indication of the significance of the full name, not an attempt to inform the reader of what people have chosen to call it (there is already a page for this). Notice that for all (other) traps we do not list the common name. Please accept this as sufficient reason to drop this "issue". You are no longer arguing about the same point. --Hyperchao 08:50, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

You've used the word "abbreviation". It's not an abbreviation, it's an acronym. Acronyms, abbreviations and initialisms are entirely different things, and entirely different rules apply. If you can't or won't get it right, then drop the common name from the article, which will at least then be, as you point out, consistent with the articles on the other traps. --Winelight 08:58, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

• You are very much stuck on making distinctions of abbreviation, acronym, and initialism. This is not even relevant for this issue, but if you insist, I will play your game. For starters, acronyms and initialisms are types of abbreviations. This is fact. Second, the only real distinction you can make between acronyms and initialisms is that you pronounce an acronym as a word but read each letter of an initialism. In reality, this distinction is usually not made. Especially in print. They are all considered abbreviations. Read them as you wish.
• You also insist that the abbreviation of the trap must be an acronym simply because it happens that its abbreviation spells out a common English word. Again, the page simply points out the abbreviation of the trap name and does not impose a "correct" way to refer to the trap. I understand why you are arguing, but the content in the page referring to an acronym has been removed. All you see is a formal abbreviation. The abbreviation points out the significance of the name for those who are not already aware. There is no intent for determining usage.
• Finally, I will acknowledge your arguments about details, although they ultimately do not pertain to the main issue if you understand my first two points. NASA as B.Rossow pointed out is in fact an acronym. It is pronounced LIKE a word, but it is not necessarily a common word. As such, you would not correctly refer to it as Nasa or nasa. FBI is an initialism; you are correct. Words like laser and sonar were originally capitalized as they were acronyms, but not common words. After many years of use, they became common nouns as you see them today. Before then, LASER was never referred to as Laser, nor SONAR as Sonar. The fact that the acronym for the trap is spelled the same way as an existing common noun does not suggest that the term is ubiquitous enough to be un-capitalized in any way. Especially if you consider English as a whole and not just "Mousehunt English". The search term "Acronym" is used throughout the wiki for convenience for editors and readers. It is the simplest, most commonly used method of referring to the trap. This still has nothing to do with the abbreviation shown on the trap page. For multiple instances of your arguing about acronyms/initialisms/abbreviations, see the first bullet. Don't get me started on the idea of considering Internet usage of English as examples of correct, formal usage. I would suggest that you focus your editing energy in other more productive areas.

--Hyperchao 09:47, 21 August 2009 (UTC)