Communicating in Spite of TLAs (Three-Letter Acronyms): Part I: It May Not Be Painless, but It's Quick

Technically speaking, an acronym is an abbreviation that is pronounced as word, made up of the first letters of first parts of the words in a term, while an initialism is an abbreviation that is not pronounced as a word, made up of the first letters of the words in a term. So what really determines whether an abbreviation in an acronym or an initialism? I am going to call all these abbreviations acronyms(omega)s does the rest of the world.