Basic Trope: A robot or other AI has a name/title that's an acronym for what it does.
- Straight: A robot designed to do chores is named A.D.A., which stands for Automated Domestic Assistant.
- Exaggerated: There's a robot that has many purposes, or a very complicated purpose, that appears to have a first, middle, and last name which is a very long acronym.
- Downplayed: The robot's name is related to its purpose and is a pun on a person's name but doesn't spell it perfectly (e.g. "LOR-E" for Lori or "N1GEL" for Nigel).
- Justified: A.D.A.'s designers thought that she needed a snappy name so as not to sound too intimidating, but also a mnemonic for remembering her purpose.
- Inverted: The humans' names are all acronyms, while the robots have proper names.
- Subverted: Alice assumes Ada's name stands for something, but it turns out to just be a name.
- Double Subverted: Alice then meets another robot whose name is an acronym.
- Parodied:
- There's a robot whose initials spell out the word "acronym".
- Whenever A.D.A. is addressed as "Automated Domestic Assistant", it's treated like a Full-Name Ultimatum.
- Zigzagged: Some robots' names are acronyms, some are proper names, and some are just numbers.
- A.D.A.'s name went through several different meanings before ultimately becoming an Artifact Title. A.D.A. then decides to simplify it to just Ada if there is no longer an acronym meaning to her name. Until she becomes a goddess and dubs herself 'Ascended Defender of All' and goes to ADA.
- Averted:
- There are no AI's.
- The AI's don't have acronyms for names.
- Enforced:
- Lampshaded: "My official title is Automated Domestic Assistant, but you can just call me A.D.A. I've found it saves time."
- Invoked: Automated Domestic Assistant was not supposed to be sapient. A.D.A. dubs herself as a mark of her origins while still being characteristic of a name.
- Exploited: If anyone needs to remember A.D.A.'s job, they can just look at her name.
- Defied: A.D.A. has her name changed to Mary to set herself apart from the other cleaning robots.
- Discussed: "What should we name our new robot? Should it have an actual name, an acronym, a number, or what?"
- Conversed: "What does that robot's name stand for again in that cartoon? Automated something..."
- Implied: ADA's name is always written in capitals but it's never revealed what it might stand for.
- Deconstructed:
- Reconstructed:
- Played for Laughs: The robot's initials end up spelling out "FART".
- Played for Drama: A.D.A.'s name itself is a source of angst to her that she was always Just a Machine to them.
- Played for Horror: A Killer Robot's initials spell out "DOOM".
Back to A.I.-cronym.
