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Path: utzoo!kcarroll
From: kcarroll@utzoo.UUCP (Kieran A. Carroll)
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
Subject: Re: SF & juveniles
Message-ID: <3245@utzoo.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 11-Oct-83 15:06:30 EDT
Article-I.D.: utzoo.3245
Posted: Tue Oct 11 15:06:30 1983
Date-Received: Tue, 11-Oct-83 15:06:30 EDT
References: <12285@sri-arpa.UUCP>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
Lines: 30

   Alright, Anecdote Time...

   The way that I heard it, the term "sci-fi", pronounced "sky-fie",
was invented by the noted SF fan Forrest Ackerman in the 1950's.
The term was based on the contemporary term "hi-fi", referring to
high-fidelity sound-reproduction equipment. His motive was to separate
the sheep from the wolves; that is, the amateurs and tyros in the SF
field from the much more knowledgable and sophisticated fans
(in those days, fandom was much more cohesive than it is today, with
a fairly small group of people all reading the same magazines, 
corresponding through letter columns, and attending the same conventions).
He may have done this in response to the explosive growth in published
SF during the 50's, accompanied by a large number of professed
SF fans and writers who were science-fictionally illeterate, and 
threatened to swamp the field, and destroy its identity.
The idea was that the old guard would use the term SF, while the 
unaware newcomers would say sci-fi, making themselves objects of derision
(at least, until they learned better). 
   Unfortunately, SF has by now lost much of its identity, with many of the
early writers dead and a new generation of readers (numbering 
probably many more than the entire of SF fandom in the '50s)
considering Alan Dean Foster's "Star Wars" adaptations to be 
classic sci-fi; oh, it makes me mad...!

   I forget where I heard this particular story; I've undoubtedly gotten
some of the details wrong. Are there any fans out there who know
Forry Ackerman, who could fill in the picture?

-Kieran A. Carroll
...decvax!utzoo!kcarroll