I was reading Dennis Forbes’ post Interesting Facts About Domain Names (via Seth Godin) when I came upon the following excerpt:
Stepping up to four letter sequences, choosing among the 456,976 combinations, yields a vastly greater availability — perhaps the set is a bit too large for domain speculators and their unlikely success with random sequences — with 97,786 showing as open. A quick check verifies that most are legitimately available. “Choice” domains, such as _AGJV.com, EIYK.com, GZVW.com, and QFEV.com. Adding digits into the mix and there are a massive 1.16 million open domains, so long as you’re looking for something like 7RG8.com, or U3JZ.com. Choose one and then manufacture a ridiculous backronym to explain it._
Backronym - ha ha - that is the first time I’ve seen that. I don’t know if Dennis is the originator or not, his freewheeling use of it suggests not, but it is great.
Backronym = reverse engineering a proper name to match a predefined acronym.
Beautiful - a new word to add to my dictionary. It will fit nicely between Back Hair and Basket of Ribs (from Applebees).