ISO (International Organization for Standardization)

ISO (pronounced “eye-soh”) is an international organization made up of bored bureaucrats who love nothing more than creating useless standards for the rest of the world to follow.

The acronym ISO actually stands for the Greek word “isos”, meaning “equal”. But let’s be real, who cares about that when we can make jokes about it meaning “International Society for Overthinking”?

ISO has a ridiculous amount of standards, some of which are actually helpful, like the ISO 9001 certification for quality management. But then there are others like the ISO 8601 standard for the date format (YYYY-MM-DD) which nobody asked for and makes us all feel like robots.

Some people also refer to ISO as the “I Seek Organization” because let’s face it, they just love to make things complicated. Need a standard for water bottles? ISO’s got you covered with ISO 12875-1:2011. But wait, there’s more! There’s also an ISO standard for testing toilet paper (ISO 12625-3:2005) because apparently, that’s what this world really needs.

If you’re feeling particularly uninspired, you can always turn to ISO for some excitement. Whether it’s ISO 50001 for energy management or ISO/IEC 19770-1 for software asset management, you can always count on ISO to make your life a little bit more boring.

In conclusion, ISO is an organization full of people who take themselves very seriously, but in reality, they just love to make life more complicated for the rest of us. But hey, at least we know that our water bottles and toilet paper meet international standards, right?