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At the 42nd annual TWI (Technical Writers' Institute), held earlier this
month at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, NY, one of the
speakers, Lee Odell, made an interesting observation about guidelines
that folks often use (or advocate) for writing:
"Ignore any guideline rather than do something stupid."
I think this applies to rules about acronyms/initialisms, as well as
bunches of other rules that folks get uptight about. No, this doesn't
settle the a/an debate with S-Q-L/SEQUEL, but it's still something to
live by.
