Talk:RAS syndrome

Can we add CAC?

I can't count the number of times I've heard someone talk about their "cac card".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Access_Card —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.132.205.29 (talk) 20:08, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

True, but is it a common enough term outside of the military or DoD to warrant inclusion? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 158.15.255.228 (talk) 14:07, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Further examples perhaps qualifying for inclusion

• SALT Talks
• START Treaty (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty Treaty)
• CD Disc. DVD disk is even more used.
• RPG Game —Preceding unsigned comment added by 115.162.6.233 (talk) 16:29, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

-Anomalocaris (talk) 18:54, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

CSBC Corporation, Taiwan - where CSBC stands for China Shipbuilding Corporation, hence, "China Shipbuilding Corporation Corporation, Taiwan". The official name of the company is "CSBC Corporation, Taiwan" since 2007, where it was previously known as just CSBC. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 04:58, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

UPC code. swain (talk) 00:10, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

MIDI interface. --188.126.207.212 (talk) 21:12, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

I somewhat surprised that no one has suggested 'AC current' (Alternating current current). 86.178.9.171 (talk) 09:04, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

It's already mentioned, in the "Reasons for use" section ;) -- Quiddity (talk) 20:46, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

• FLOPS per second (floating-point operations per second per second)

Added to the page by 82.101.19.66 on 17:30, 9 November 2011. Moved here by Cnilep (talk) 00:38, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

• DC Comics (Detective Comics Comics) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.202.252.106 (talk) 16:44, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

• HIV Virus AndrewHZ (talk) 22:00, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

Seconded!! One of my pet peeves in newspapers. So if there should be added one more, it's this, because medicine/science has not yet been covered in the list at all. Plus, 3 is really a bit too few. BTW, it's even mentioned in Paul's list: http://public.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/hiv.html -andy 77.191.218.187 (talk) 15:54, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

• ISBN number — Justinbb (talk) 02:07, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

• Windows 2000's boot screen saying it was "Built on NT technology." And two that are widespread in the medical imaging field: "MPR reconstruction" and "PACS system." --UrsoBR (talk) 15:41, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

• PCR reaction (polymerase chain reaction reaction) added to the page by User:J. Walter Weatherman; moved here by Cnilep (talk) 02:11, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

• RIP in peace — Preceding unsigned comment added by Alxbnt (talk • contribs) 23:35, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

• NIC card AndrewHZ (talk)

• DSL line AndrewHZ (talk) — Preceding undated comment added 17:39, 11 August 2014 (UTC)

• GMT Time AndrewHZ (talk) 16:05, 22 September 2014 (UTC)

• Lanby buoy – Large Automatic Navigation BuoY 86.42.254.182 (talk) 19:36, 28 March 2016 (UTC)

• GPA average AndrewHZ (talk) 17:24, 6 July 2016 (UTC)

"These 3 items"

I have just rolled back two added examples, noting "Consensus is to keep the list at these 3 items." I copied that edit summary from the hidden comment on the page. To my slight embarrassment, though, I see that there are currently only two examples listed, following Afjweb's edit to remove CSS. There is an older comment above pointing out that CSS is a problematic example, since it is also called "less applicable" further down the page.

Can we work toward some consensus on a new item to add to the examples? I think that three is a nice number: large enough to illustrate the pattern, but short enough not to invite attempts to be exhaustive.

Examples suggested in the past include:

• PCB board (printed circut board board)
• UPC code (universal product code code)
• LCD display (liquid crystal display display)
• RCP plan (reflected ceiling plan plan)
• ISP provider (internet service provider provider)
• GUI interface (graphical user interface interface)

See also the numerous examples suggested in other sections of this talk page.

My vote is for "UPC code", since I feel it is the most commonly used. (I have no empirical evidence for that feeling, though.) LCD display is perhaps equally frequent and equally well-known; the others seem either slightly obscure (RCP, GUI) or unlikely to to use the expanded form (PCB board, ISP provider). Cnilep (talk) 04:30, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

I stand corrected: the Corpus of Contemporary American English lists 5 examples of "UPC code" and 65 of "LCD display" in its 425 million word corpus. I'll add that example for the time being. Comment here if you disagree. Cnilep (talk) 04:38, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

UPC codes are rarely talked about by "the common man" (although extremely frequently used!); LCD displays, however, are a frequently marketed and discussed consumer technology, so it seems intuitive to me that it be a more common example. - IMSoP (talk) 00:11, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Two more examples

[I understand it's useful to keep the article's example list trimmed, but it seems to me this talk page is a fine place to collect additional examples.]

Now that LEDs are being used in more and more lighting applications, we're starting to hear people refer to "LED lights".

My favorite: The La Brea tar pits, which if you translate the original Spanish name expands to "The The Tar Tar Pits". (But I guess this isn't really an acronym issue.) —Steve Summit (talk) 14:24, 6 March 2013 (UTC)

PIN number

Unlike with others like "ATM machine" which are clearly redundant, "PIN number" is not completely redundant. There are other types of pins. 4.238.1.82 (talk) 22:55, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

Not true, for several reasons:

• The basic meaning of "redundant" is that something is repeated. It doesn't necessarily indicate that the repetition serves no purpose. Sometimes redundancy does serve a purpose, e.g. error detection and correction and other failsafe systems.
• You've already distinguished it from a pin, by writing "PIN" instead of "pin".
• Even in speech, where you don't have this way of distinguishing them, the phrase "pin number" could equally be a number by which a pin is identified. I imagine that this is common in discussions of audio-visual and computer peripheral connectors.
• 99% of the time, whether a PIN or a pin is being talked about is obvious from the context.
• Even if we did need a way to distinguish the two in speech, what's wrong with "PINumber" or "pea eye en"?

— Smjg (talk) 18:26, 28 July 2013 (UTC)

Plus: An acronym/initialism can stand for more than one thing. So people could potentially say "ATM machine" or "ATM Manager" to distinguish them, though it is still silly. — Smjg (talk) 19:38, 28 July 2013 (UTC)

PNS syndrome

In July 2013 User:TenPoundHammer removed several bits of unsourced or badly sourced information. I have, however, recently restored one part of that information.

The old version of the page asserted, "The similar term PNS syndrome (which expands to "PIN number syndrome syndrome", and further to "personal identification number number syndrome syndrome") was coined by Usenet users before the coining of RAS Syndrome", and quoted a Google archive of alt.possessive.its.has.no.apostrophe. As TenPoundHammer noted, a Usenet group is not a reliable source, since it is user-generated. It is a particularly unfit source for this bit of information, since it is a primary source.

Nonetheless, the primary source does reveal that the word "PNS syndrome" was used on Usenet. I have therefore changed the article to read, "The similar term PNS syndrome (which expands to "personal identification number number syndrome syndrome") was used by Usenet users." I have also tagged the assertion as requiring a non-primary source. Note that this assertion makes no unverified claim about the word's origin. Cnilep (talk) 00:48, 23 October 2013 (UTC) @Cnilep:I doubt a secondary source would ever come up verifying that something was the case on Usenet. I can think of a billion Usenet-isms that would never have a secondary source verifying their existence. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 01:20, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

Acronyms become used as words

I think it might be worth noting in the section describing reasonable usage that often acronyms end up being used as if they were words themselves. For example, RSVP (the French for something like "respond please" has become an English verb meaning "to respond to an invitation; to comfirm whether or not one will attend an event" or similar. It is often used with suffexes: "Nancy RSVPed via email"; "When did RSVPing fall out of fashion?" When taking as a word rather than an acronym, it makes sense for the apparent redundancy. HIV is a type of virus, as is flu. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.4.155.39 (talk) 10:50, 10 April 2014 (UTC)

FMS Surname

Rab Butler, Jeb Bush jnestorius^(talk) 12:41, 20 September 2014 (UTC)

If there is ever a list of self-demonstrating articles, this should be on it

For examples of self-demonstrating articles you can look on tv tropes BobHelmut (talk) 14:54, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

BRD examples

@Thewolfchild:, can we discuss? We should find citations for all of them, otherwise it's WP:OR. (PDF doesn't have one, but I'll remove that once WP:3RR expires.) Origamite^ⓣⓒ 14:34, 18 February 2015 (UTC)

For example, we could cite to here. Origamite^ⓣⓒ 14:37, 18 February 2015 (UTC)

The one I added has a cite. If the list is capped at 5, and you're going to remove "PDF" (and presumably replace it with "HIV"), then problem solved. - ^theWOLFchild 20:04, 18 February 2015 (UTC)

No--we need a cite saying that it's an RAS, not just that it's DC comics. Please read the policy on original research. Origamite^ⓣⓒ 01:34, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

Is this a good example?

NES system(Nintendo Entertainment System system) 83.240.82.223 (talk) 20:09, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

Yes, but we'd need a source referring to it as a RAS. You could list examples forever, so we try to keep it to 5. Origamite^ⓣⓒ 21:55, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

OPEC countries

I don't think 'OPEC countries' qualifies as "technically redundant". OPEC stands for Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, and therefore it's an 'organization' when OPEC itself is used. OPEC countries therefore, in my opinion, correctly refers to 'the countries' (i.e. member states) of this organization as opposed to referring to the organization itself. Just my 2 cents. To further clarify my viewpoint, I'd say an 'OPEC organization' expression would qualify as "technically redundant" instead. Babach (talk) 17:38, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

Agree—"OPEC countries" is not redundant in the same way that "PIN number" is. It's a superficial mistake to jump to the idea that it is. For that matter, if you say that "various US states have laws about topic X," the phrase "US states" is also not in the same class as "PIN number". This seems obvious to me, but if anyone needs analysis to explain how it is true, speak up, it could be worked up if people need it. I abridged the quote in the article by ellipsing past "OPEC". It is still a good and valid quote even with the ellipsis. — ¾-10 01:38, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

Recently removed

User:Prinsgezinde removed some content with two edits, which I later reverted. Prinsgezinde suggested that the intentional redundancy is "understood" and "doesn't need citations". I'm a bit of fanatic for citations, so I disagree.

Prinsgezinde also noted that Redundant Acronym Phrases is a less reliable source. I agree; it is a primary source using the name. But I also note that other (not necessarily reliable, but independent) sources also use the label "RAP" (example 1, 2). Cnilep (talk) 04:24, 4 April 2016 (UTC)

Well I'm not going to challenge you since I have only limited interest in this article, but it seemed to me that most people would be able to spot the irony in the name. Either way, those sources are self-published and can not be used to verify the use of a name. I think the current name, RAS syndrome, is enough. Bataaf van Oranje (talk) 08:44, 4 April 2016 (UTC)

Recursive RAS Syndrom

Guys,

I understand that you wish to keep only 5 examples. However, I would like to discuss the opportunity to add a new one, which can be considered as a redundant redundant acronym syndrome syndrome (Redundant RAS Syndrom) : The TOGAF Framework (The/The Open Group Architecture Framework/Framework). I don't find it relevant to create a new article for Redundant RAS Syndrom but adding this example would do the job.

Don't hesitate to share your comments. Regards, — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.207.220.1 (talk) 12:29, 13 May 2016 (UTC)