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> The GNSS-based Upper Atmospheric Realtime Disaster Information and Alert Network (GUARDIAN) is an ionospheric monitoring yadayadayadascience That's a pretty

> The GNSS-based Upper Atmospheric Realtime Disaster Information and Alert Network (GUARDIAN) is an ionospheric monitoring yadayadayadascience That's a pretty impressive number of scrabble points for a project acronym, and I guess bonus points for building that acronym on top of another acronym (GNSS = Global Navigation Satellite System, generic term for America's GPS). I know government projects have a long, storied history of such wordplay. Anyone have any fun stories on coming up with a really elaborate one? I wonder if chatGPT will unleash a new era of creativity with these...

yieldcrv 2y ago
GNSSbUARDIAN
sailfast 2y ago
I still think the USA PATRIOT Act is the most diabolical. “Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism” Also… goodbye privacy but, you know… Patriotism!
- lxgr 2y ago
  My favorite backfired backronym is definitely the CAN-SPAM act [1]. I get that it's a play on "canning something", but as a strong believer in nominative determinism, it comes as no surprise to me that companies in fact still can spam me. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CAN-SPAM_Act_of_2003 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CAN-SPAM_Act_of_2003
goochphd 2y ago
I love the creativity that goes into naming these projects in the geosciences! I've been a part of several of these projects myself, and have used data and collaborated with teams from many more. One point of clarification: GNSS is a term that has broader application than you describe, as it encompasses constellations from other countries and political associations as well. For example: * Galileo - European Union's GNSS system, named after the astronomer * BeiDou - China's GNSS system * GLONASS - Russia's GNSS system * JAXA - Japan's GNSS system One backronym that I liked from my time doing my PhD was RELAMPAGO, which is a Spanish word for "lightning," but which some group of scientists gave this definition: "Remote sensing of Electrification, Lightning, And Mesoscale/microscale Processes with Adaptive Ground Observations". It was a very cool campaign that produced a ton of amazing data, and catalyzed many dissertations (including one of my close friend's).
- beerandt 2y ago
  GPS was the more generic term until US Navstar-GPS became such the default that it aquired the generic term. And eventually dropped the Navstar, officially. Sort of a reverse Xerox/Google/Velcro situation.
beerandt 2y ago
GPS was originally NAVSTAR or Navstar-GPS (names helped, going back to when LORAN was state of the art and other competing dod navigation systems were being developed, like the Navy's TRANSIT sats). But lots of old school pros like surveyors will still refer to it as 'Navstar', which has resurged with the introduction of competing GNSS systems from other countries. Especially if you want to avoid the GPS/GNSS confusion. There's debate about whether NAVSTAR itself was ever an acronym/backroom, or just a name. "NAVigation System using Timing And Ranging"
xattt 2y ago
I thought GPS was generic and NAVSTAR was the “brand”.
sumofproducts 2y ago
Maritime Augmented Guidance with Integrated Controls for Carrier Approach and Recovery Precision Enabling Technologies: MAGIC CARPET.
notahacker 2y ago
> I wonder if chatGPT will unleash a new era of creativity with these... Can confirm I've already submitted at least one bid with a chatGPT-derived acronym, complete with an X for scrabble points. I'll chalk that one up as an argument in favour of "LLMs will take over the world", as coming up with cool acronyms involving sciency-sounding words genuinely might be one of the most important jobs in the space industry
nimbius 2y ago
Gnss includes other systems like glonass and beidou, not just GPS. Frankly GPS is so outmoded as to be a questionable source of meaningful data for things like ionospheric metrics. Beidou is light years ahead in both speed and fidelity.
grecy 2y ago
When I worked at defence it was an important part of getting funding that your project had a catchy acronym. Bonus points for combining multiple TLAs

yieldcrv 2y ago

GNSSbUARDIAN

sailfast 2y ago

I still think the USA PATRIOT Act is the most diabolical. “Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism” Also… goodbye privacy but, you know… Patriotism!

lxgr 2y ago
My favorite backfired backronym is definitely the CAN-SPAM act [1]. I get that it's a play on "canning something", but as a strong believer in nominative determinism, it comes as no surprise to me that companies in fact still can spam me. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CAN-SPAM_Act_of_2003 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CAN-SPAM_Act_of_2003

goochphd 2y ago

I love the creativity that goes into naming these projects in the geosciences! I've been a part of several of these projects myself, and have used data and collaborated with teams from many more. One point of clarification: GNSS is a term that has broader application than you describe, as it encompasses constellations from other countries and political associations as well. For example: * Galileo - European Union's GNSS system, named after the astronomer * BeiDou - China's GNSS system * GLONASS - Russia's GNSS system * JAXA - Japan's GNSS system One backronym that I liked from my time doing my PhD was RELAMPAGO, which is a Spanish word for "lightning," but which some group of scientists gave this definition: "Remote sensing of Electrification, Lightning, And Mesoscale/microscale Processes with Adaptive Ground Observations". It was a very cool campaign that produced a ton of amazing data, and catalyzed many dissertations (including one of my close friend's).

beerandt 2y ago
GPS was the more generic term until US Navstar-GPS became such the default that it aquired the generic term. And eventually dropped the Navstar, officially. Sort of a reverse Xerox/Google/Velcro situation.

beerandt 2y ago

GPS was originally NAVSTAR or Navstar-GPS (names helped, going back to when LORAN was state of the art and other competing dod navigation systems were being developed, like the Navy's TRANSIT sats). But lots of old school pros like surveyors will still refer to it as 'Navstar', which has resurged with the introduction of competing GNSS systems from other countries. Especially if you want to avoid the GPS/GNSS confusion. There's debate about whether NAVSTAR itself was ever an acronym/backroom, or just a name. "NAVigation System using Timing And Ranging"

xattt 2y ago

I thought GPS was generic and NAVSTAR was the “brand”.

sumofproducts 2y ago

Maritime Augmented Guidance with Integrated Controls for Carrier Approach and Recovery Precision Enabling Technologies: MAGIC CARPET.

notahacker 2y ago

> I wonder if chatGPT will unleash a new era of creativity with these... Can confirm I've already submitted at least one bid with a chatGPT-derived acronym, complete with an X for scrabble points. I'll chalk that one up as an argument in favour of "LLMs will take over the world", as coming up with cool acronyms involving sciency-sounding words genuinely might be one of the most important jobs in the space industry

nimbius 2y ago

Gnss includes other systems like glonass and beidou, not just GPS. Frankly GPS is so outmoded as to be a questionable source of meaningful data for things like ionospheric metrics. Beidou is light years ahead in both speed and fidelity.

grecy 2y ago

When I worked at defence it was an important part of getting funding that your project had a catchy acronym. Bonus points for combining multiple TLAs