Human beings are very good at inventing quite complicated, clever things and then forgetting entirely what they are for. Fast food, elevator music and representative democracy are all cases in point.

Nowhere is this more obvious, however, than in the human drive to abbreviate.

As has been endlessly pointed out elsewhere, abbreviation is, all things considered, a surprisingly long word. An abbreviation provides a shorthand way of getting to the point.

Notorious 'Jargonauts' have, however, lost their way in ascribing to that wonder of late second millennial technology, the internet, the appalling abbreviation "www". While representing an efficient 3 strokes on the computer keyboard, the oral and aural bandwidth consumed daily by the murmurings of "double-yu double-yu double-yu dot..." is staggering.