laws@ai.sri.com (Kenneth I. Laws) (06/29/91)
Is there a readily accessibly file of new telecomm words available somewhere? I notice that some people in this forum use "email", others like "e-mail" or "Email". I like to be cutting-edge instead of conservative, and I'm sure that "email" will eventually win as the accepted term. (The others are essentially abbreviations for electronic mail, and any such mental expansion is too cumbersome for a neologism.) Still, I see "e-mail" preferred in certain newspapers and news journals. I likewise favor "online" over "on-line", but have to accept the hyphen in "off-line" as essential for stumble-free reading. For jargon-laced discussions, I find "bboard" a perfectly acceptable word -- whereas "Bboard" or "BBoard" looks rather ugly. "BBS" is common and very useful, but I've never been able to read it without imagining a "British Broadcasting System." (Sorry if I've just infected anyone with this virus.) Surely I'm not the first person to worry about such terms. Is there an "approved" set? -- Ken Laws