On Mon, 20 Sep 2004 14:07:03 -0400, Sj
<2.718281828(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Although you should check your final result
against the current revision
on
WMF.org, in case there have been last-minute changes)
I would like to request that everyone stops using the abbreviation WMF
to refer to the Wikimedia Foundation. We do not own the domain name
WMF.org and it is not likely we ever will. If people make the effort
not to use it, it will reduce confusion and misdirected traffic.
Although I quote Sj above, this is in no way directed only at him.
It's bad enough that we don't own
wikimedia.com that I think efforts
should be made to prevent even more links to sites that are not really
us.
Good point, both in the particular and in general. To me WMF normally
refers to the World Monetary Fund. It made me wonder what they had to
do with Wikimedia fundraising. :-)
The problem with initialisms is bigger than unavailable domain names.
There are other possible misunderstandings when an initialism is used.
One example that led to a furious exchange more than a year ago was over
"LOL". The user intended it as "Lots of Luck" to encourage the
contributor; the recipient read it as "Laughing out Loud" and felt that
his work was being insulted.
Ec