From: b.scott@csuohio.edu   
      
   On Fri, 26 Dec 2008 16:14:40 -0500, Joy Beeson   
    wrote in   
    in   
   rec.arts.sf.misc:   
      
   [...]   
      
   >   No matter how common an   
   > abbreviation is, one *always* spells it out on first   
   > reference.   
      
   > Unless it's so common that people don't recognize the   
   > spelled-out form . . .   [...]   
      
   Context also matters.  In an article in the business section   
   of a newspaper one would normally assume that 'CEO' was   
   self-explanatory.  In a reference work one would normally   
   assume that 'd. 1349' was self-explanatory.  In a   
   mathematics paper one writes, for instance, 'A space (X, T)   
   is compact (resp. Lindelöf) if every open cover of X has a   
   finite (resp. countable) subcover', and in such a context   
   'resp.' is not expanded to 'respectively' on first   
   occurrence.   
      
   Then there's 'IOU', though I suppose that you could say that   
   it spells itself out ... .   
      
   Brian   
      
   Brian   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)