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Author Topic: scrabble question  (Read 12430 times)

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Offline Discover99

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scrabble question
« on: February 11, 2011, 03:15:39 PM »
hi
I'm wondering about acronyms: why am I not allowed
to play a word like FBI albeit jato is fine. I looked it up
and the definitions I found said it's an acronym too.
does somebody care to explain?
 :)
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Online dweez

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Re: scrabble question
« Reply #1 on: February 11, 2011, 04:23:52 PM »
jato, "jet-assisted take off" shouldn't be allowed as I have found no other definitions for it on m-w.com or dictionary.com.  This site agrees with me.

http://www.collinslanguage.com/extras/scrabble.aspx
« Last Edit: February 11, 2011, 04:27:01 PM by dweez »
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Offline smokester

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Re: scrabble question
« Reply #2 on: February 11, 2011, 04:27:54 PM »

It's because JATO has been regularised like SCUBA or RADAR, so it becomes acceptable in scrabble.

Just one of those things Disco.
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Offline Discover99

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Re: scrabble question
« Reply #3 on: February 11, 2011, 05:47:10 PM »
 
Quote from: smokester on February 11, 2011, 04:27:54 PM
It's because JATO has been regularised like SCUBA or RADAR, so it becomes acceptable in scrabble.

Just one of those things Disco.

thanks :)

does regularized mean
a that I pronounce the letters as if they
were a regular word in opposite of FBI or ASAP
b that it's not written in capital letters?

btw I didn't know your examples were acronyms too.
We say radar in German too and I grew up using it and never spent a second thought on it. 

 
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Offline smokester

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Re: scrabble question
« Reply #4 on: February 11, 2011, 06:04:53 PM »
I have to confess, it was Dweez who taught me that "SCUBA" (self contained underwater breathing apparatus) was an acronym, when he mentioned it here. Strange that I had never come across that before as I knew that others, probably because I can't swim :)

Regularised means that they have almost become the word that they are describing - a noun if you like - but they can't really ever stop being acronyms as that is their etymology. Personally I wouldn't consider JATO as a regularised acronym, but I believe within certain professions it would be.

The other thing (which is purely my opinion), is that I think for an acronym to become regularised in a grammatical form, it would have to have a legitimate spelling structure that could be spoken differently to the acronym itself.  For instance: RADAR is spoken as a word not a string of letters, whereas, FBI has to be sounded out in 3 separate parts and not "fuhbee", so you can see why it wouldn't really work in scrabble?
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Offline subvinorosa

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Re: scrabble question
« Reply #5 on: February 12, 2011, 08:08:08 AM »
Because it would be totally awesome to put a J on the triple letter tile and getting the double word tile to boot. 
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Offline redlandslide

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Re: scrabble question
« Reply #6 on: February 12, 2011, 01:52:42 PM »
The Oxford dictionary definition for acronism is - an abbreviation formed from the initial letters of other words and pronounced as a word (e.g. ASCII, NASA).

which technically would suggest that FBI isn't one anyway, but rather an initialism.

Oxford's definition of initialism - an abbreviation consisting of initial letters pronounced separately (e.g. BBC).
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Online dweez

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Re: scrabble question
« Reply #7 on: February 12, 2011, 02:08:46 PM »
Yeah, "regularised" acronyms are generally decided on by community, whether world-wide, as in SCUBA and RADAR, or a more distinct community, say the Texting world with things like, lol, omw, swak, etc.

I always thought a good rule of thumb was that if it got a submission in the Merriam-Webster or Oxford Dictionary.

Also, another difference between FBI and JATO is that FBI is an acronym for a proper noun (gov't agency in this case) while jato isn't and proper nouns aren't allowed in Scrabble.
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Offline Discover99

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Re: scrabble question
« Reply #8 on: February 12, 2011, 02:38:18 PM »
thanks so much for your answers! this is really interesting to me
also I hadn't heard of initial anacronyms before and tbh I dont really get the concept. 
but on some level it makes much more sense now :)


I had to look up swak - sealed with a kiss, used in a text message? that's funny
« Last Edit: February 12, 2011, 02:41:36 PM by Discover99 »
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Offline goldshirt*9

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Re: scrabble question
« Reply #9 on: February 13, 2011, 12:48:02 AM »
buy a scrabble dictionary and have a read of it  :o
what weird words are in it .
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Offline smokester

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Re: scrabble question
« Reply #10 on: February 13, 2011, 05:06:45 AM »
Quote from: Discover99 on February 12, 2011, 02:38:18 PM

I had to look up swak - sealed with a kiss, used in a text message? that's funny

Since a child I have always known that as SWALK (sealed with a loving kiss). especially as it was the name of this great movie that I grew up with.
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Offline goldshirt*9

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Re: scrabble question
« Reply #11 on: March 08, 2011, 01:05:21 AM »
movie looks interesting
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Offline mishca09

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Re: scrabble question
« Reply #12 on: March 11, 2011, 09:02:29 PM »
Scrabble is addictiing. I cant stop playing since I downloaded the app for my phone
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Offline smokester

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Re: scrabble question
« Reply #13 on: March 12, 2011, 04:10:49 AM »
Quote from: mishca09 on March 11, 2011, 09:02:29 PM
Scrabble is addictiing. I cant stop playing since I downloaded the app for my phone

I used to have it on a couple of PPCs and the missus and myself played via bluetooth.  The problem was it didn't like British English :(
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Don't put off until tomorrow, what you can put off until the day after.

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Offline Discover99

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Re: scrabble question
« Reply #14 on: March 12, 2011, 05:57:33 AM »
Quote from: mishca09 on March 11, 2011, 09:02:29 PM
Scrabble is addictiing. I cant stop playing since I downloaded the app for my phone


are you playing words with friends?
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