4 ms·

I like calling these "anachronyms," because they're sort of like anachronistic acronyms (yes, fine, this one's _technically_ an initialism). I wrote a blog post

I like calling these "anachronyms," because they're sort of like anachronistic acronyms (yes, fine, this one's _technically_ an initialism). I wrote a blog post[0] about them. [0]: https://simpsonian.ca/blog/anachronyms/ https://simpsonian.ca/blog/anachronyms/

Nition 3y ago
ARM might be another good one. Acorn computers don't even exist anymore.
- Angostura 3y ago
  Sun Microsystems - came from Stanford University Network Apple's Siri, came from SRI - Stanford Research Institute
- sgerenser 3y ago
  It’s no longer even an acronym, the official name is now Arm.
  - Nition 3y ago
    That's what I mean - that's how the parent defined an "anachronym". But yeah, there was that transitional phase where they first just redefined the acronym.
    - Dylan16807 3y ago
      But also, even later they got rid of the all-caps (at least mostly). It went from an acronym of nothing to just a word.
      - djur 3y ago
        Isn't it "Arm" because it's British and Brits typically write pronounceable acronyms in proper noun case (e.g. "Nato" vs. "UN")?
        OJFord 3y ago
        No, that's a media/journalist thing, companies themselves can do whatever. As far as I could tell (I worked at A(RM|rm) at the time, but not on this, no particular inside knowledge or anything) it may as well just have been to get people to stop saying 'ay-ar-em', since it was already not an acronym as said up thread; just a branding change, font change. In fact to your point in particular no you can tell it's not that, because note the 'a' is also lower case in the logo and anything styled.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
mort96 3y ago
Oh I'm definitely going to start using that name.
thayne 3y ago
> yes, fine, this one's _technically_ an initialism From the wikipedia article on acronyms[1], an initialism is a kind of acronym. There are some definitions that specify that it must be pronounced as a word, although in common usage acronym includes initialisms , and what iteans to be "pronounced as a word" is kind of imprecise anyway. Is CIA pronounced as a single word, but the pronunciation comes from the pronunciation of the letters? I'd argue that it a single lexeme at least. [1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acronym https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acronym
card_zero 3y ago
Wikipedia calls these "orphan initialisms", with a couple of citations (halfway down the page for Acronym): "an existing acronym is redefined as a non-acronymous name, severing its link to its previous meaning." But yours is catchier. Oh, I see they have "anacronym" too, with a fine distinction of meaning. It's the difference between the word officially ceasing to stand for anything, and the public generally forgetting the word stands for.

Nition 3y ago

ARM might be another good one. Acorn computers don't even exist anymore.

Angostura 3y ago
Sun Microsystems - came from Stanford University Network Apple's Siri, came from SRI - Stanford Research Institute
sgerenser 3y ago
It’s no longer even an acronym, the official name is now Arm.
- Nition 3y ago
  That's what I mean - that's how the parent defined an "anachronym". But yeah, there was that transitional phase where they first just redefined the acronym.
  - Dylan16807 3y ago
    But also, even later they got rid of the all-caps (at least mostly). It went from an acronym of nothing to just a word.
    - djur 3y ago
      Isn't it "Arm" because it's British and Brits typically write pronounceable acronyms in proper noun case (e.g. "Nato" vs. "UN")?
      - OJFord 3y ago
        No, that's a media/journalist thing, companies themselves can do whatever. As far as I could tell (I worked at A(RM|rm) at the time, but not on this, no particular inside knowledge or anything) it may as well just have been to get people to stop saying 'ay-ar-em', since it was already not an acronym as said up thread; just a branding change, font change. In fact to your point in particular no you can tell it's not that, because note the 'a' is also lower case in the logo and anything styled.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]

mort96 3y ago

Oh I'm definitely going to start using that name.

thayne 3y ago

> yes, fine, this one's _technically_ an initialism From the wikipedia article on acronyms[1], an initialism is a kind of acronym. There are some definitions that specify that it must be pronounced as a word, although in common usage acronym includes initialisms , and what iteans to be "pronounced as a word" is kind of imprecise anyway. Is CIA pronounced as a single word, but the pronunciation comes from the pronunciation of the letters? I'd argue that it a single lexeme at least. [1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acronym https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acronym

card_zero 3y ago

Wikipedia calls these "orphan initialisms", with a couple of citations (halfway down the page for Acronym): "an existing acronym is redefined as a non-acronymous name, severing its link to its previous meaning." But yours is catchier. Oh, I see they have "anacronym" too, with a fine distinction of meaning. It's the difference between the word officially ceasing to stand for anything, and the public generally forgetting the word stands for.