pronunciation - General rule for pronouncing initialisms?





Pronouncing acronyms



Some initialisms are pronounced letter by letter, some as a word. Is there a general rule as when to use which pronunciation for acronyms that are new and don't have well established pronunciation yet?


I've seen a lot of confusion, especially in the IT world. For example WSGI — most often letters names, but it's popularly pronounced as wizz-gy or even whiskey. Of older examples SQL most often pronounced as letter names, but officially it should be pronounced sequel.




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