Los Angeles Tech

[dawg80]

I remember owning a shirt with the Louisiana Polytechnic Institute logo. Would love to have one now. Of course I'm also a Beatles fan.

Me too...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fwt2qwPctb4

[qng001]

The problem is that the visual representation of our abbreviated name does not match the desired pronunciation.

I agree with this quote regarding our name in publications.

[qng001]

Dooley wanted us to embrace the shorthand name. LTU doesn't sound good, plus it sounds too much like LSU if people decide to chant it. "LA Tech" doesn't promote the phonetic pronunciation of "Lah Tech". LaTech or La Tech does.

[Houston Techsan]

I remember owning a shirt with the Louisiana Polytechnic Institute logo. Would love to have one now. Of course I'm also a Beatles fan.

I bought one in the spring of 1966 (LPI days) and still have it. It's a bit thin. However it says LOUISIANA TECH. Now on the sailor cap looking beanie that the bulldog has on it says LA TECH, but they're all caps so that doesn't add or subtract from anyone's argument.

[gabzooks]

I don't have a strong opinion on either side, except that I don't think it's as consequential as this thread has made it out to be. That said...
If "La Tech" were the selected and standard version (in order to avoid some apparent confusion), might the supposed problem persist when a graphic art rendition would use all caps for aesthetic purposes (as is commmon in graphic design) on a given sign, apparel or ad campaign?

Also, personally, when I see "La" in front of nearly anything, I pause a millisecond thinking "feminine Spanish article". (Not to mention "the note that follows 'So'")

[Dawg06]

I think this may be the problem:

I see y'all putting "LA Tech." That does look like El Ay Tech. But "LA TECH" looks like lah tech to me. Do we use all caps in the official brand?

Nope. The official brand is LA Tech, which is bad. It gets much worse when they squeeze it into LATech for web addresses, hashtags, twitter handles, etc. I cringe every time I see the dreaded LATech. It's terrible.

I don't have a problem with all caps LA TECH on our jerseys or logo because I don't think that's the root of the problem. If we did change our official brand to LA TECH, then we'd have a similar problem that the BIG EAST faces (as well as LA Tech). Nobody will use all caps, just like no credible media source uses LA Tech or LATech. Our admin can't even convince The Times or News-Star to use it. It's yelling and not natural so Average Joe won't use it either. It's been over 6 years since Dooley's rebranding with our SID using LA Tech or LATech at every opportunity, and it still hasn't caught on or been embraced by even our own fans. Another signal of a problem.

[Dawg06]

UCLA's big #LASteel uni reveal this morning...

[HogDawg]

You didn't read that one, did you? It clearly lists LA as a postal code and the abbreviation as La.


state-codes


usacodes


state_abrv_codes


Same link above that you didn't read. LA is postal code, and the abbreviation is La.

You didn't read this one either? It lists La. as the standard abbreviation and LA as the postal abbreviation.

You're the one that can't read. Several of those sites flat out say "LA" is the abbreviation, not just the postal code. You just have a problem with the TRUTH.

[Champ967]

Everyone I come across knows LA Tech is Louisiana. No explanation needed.

Says yet another resident of Texas ...

[Poisso3]

This is nothing new. Back in the late-80s, my dad used t sell some orange peel based cleaner or something and when he had sold past a level, they sent him a regulation size NFL football. It took forever to get to us in Winnfield, and when it arrived, we found out what took so long.

The USPS sent it to Los Angeles. Even with the correct zip code on the address, the USPS sent it to Los Angeles, CA and then couldn't figure out where Winnfield was out there in the city of Los Angeles, CA. Mind you, it was being sent from the East Coast so it wasn't as if it was someone out West thinking LA was just short for the largest city on the West Coast.

While I was on the equipment staff at Tech, we were anal about anyone calling us LA(lah) Tech. Our resoning was you never had someone say VA(vah) Tech, or GA(gah) Tech. Now, yes, we understood that not saying anything other than we were Tech would not mean crap outside of Louisiana, but that didn't stop us from getting us listed as just TECH a few times on ESPN broadcasts of our football or basketball games. Personally, I prefer LTU, but I know of a few who say they want LAT. For the people who think LA just means Los Angeles, there is nothing that can be done to fix the stupid that is in their brains, but for the rest of the population, we just need to start winning more to get LA Tech out there as a house hold name.

[Champ967]

we just need to start winning more to get LA Tech out there as a house hold name.

Im sure they're a really good school, but why do we want to get Los Angeles Tech out there as a household name? And how will Louisiana Tech winning help them anyway?

[Tech77]

You know exactly what is intended by our athletics dept. The problem is with all the other people out there who don't know any better, the people who say it exactly how they see it. I'm not sure I understand your point with those other state codes. I assume you don't hear people say those state codes because people don't speak in postal codes. AP abbreviations are what's mostly commonly used in writing, and people probably say the full name of the state more often that not. If for whatever reason somebody is reading off postal codes, then I think it's safe to say they would pronounce each letter separately. But let's stay focused here. The problem is that the visual representation of our abbreviated name does not match the desired pronunciation.

Common DI abbreviations... Which one is not supposed to be pronounced like all the others?
NC Central
NC State
NM State
OK State
SC State
UC Davis
UC Irvine
UC Riverside
UC Santa Barbara
LA Tech :icon_wink:
UL Lafayette
UT Arlington
UT Martin

Then there's...
Cal
Cal Poly
Caltech
Ole Miss
Penn
Penn State
Southern Miss
UConn
UMass
UMass Lowell
Only one syllable abbreviations... Isn't this what we want? What do all of them have in common? Lower case letters!

The athletics department's usage intent doesn't really matter if it's not intuitive to the general public. The biggest problem is not with the logo. The problem is with every tweet, publication, etc. by our athletic department and University that use LA Tech and the intolerable LATech, both of which scream they want to be pronounced El A Tech. I think that's the root of the problem, not the logo. If we fix the root of the problem by lowercasing the A, then we'd find out if the logo is a problem at all. However, I do think we should change our primary logo back to the iconic state-T.

I have heard that the Uck Irvine Anteaters play good baseball.

[champion110]

Says yet another resident of Texas ...

Who do you think is confusing it, if not people from another state? I travel a lot (almost exclusively in the U.S.), but never met anyone that confused it. Maybe in California?

[Woof!]

And how will Louisiana Tech winning help them anyway?

If you are a winning university or a "notable" university you can "take over" a name like Texas A&M took over "A&M". When someone says A&M is drastically building their football program and its facilities there is no misunderstanding that they might be talking about Prairie View A&M or any one of dozens of other A&M colleges.

[Cool Hand Clyde]

Says yet another resident of Texas ...

Don't mess with Texas.