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ImageSMART TALK
by Dr. Verbos Metikulos

MIC:  Somebody has to take a stand, and the Institute for the Linguistically Impaired is taking it.  It may cost us some financial support from a few of our regular donors, but we hope others will feel vindicated at last and step up to join our cause.  We are unanimous:

The word mic has no place in intelligent English usage.

The microphone has been in use in various forms since before most of us were born.  True to our habit of abbreviating long words and expressions for casual useage - as when one of Vice President (under Truman) Alban Barkley's grandchildren suggested "veep" instead of his four-syllable title - folks in show "biz" referred to a microphone as a mike, and, sensibly, spelled it that way.

Mike it remained for decades, as in open mike night and step up to the mike.

But then, not long before the Internet, we had quaint machines called tape recorders.  They and amplifiers, which we still use, often had a place to plug in a microphone.  The manufacturers, to save space and limit control labels to three letters, abbreviated microphone, reasonable enough, as mic.

Linguistic corrosion ensued.  Many linguistically impaired users of sound equipment thought mic was the standard short form instead of mike.  They even thought mic was pronounced mike.  Like an electorate following the lead of neocons, too few asked questions.

At roughly the same time, digital clocks were leading unquestioning users astray as well.  For centuries, anyone who could tell time knew enough to read a clock as saying 10:00 A.M., 11:00 A.M., and 12:00 A.M. (noon), followed by 12:01 P.M.  No problem at night, either: 11:00 P.M., 12:00 P.M. (midnight), then 12:01 A.M.

But the designers of digital clocks apparently couldn't program them to change from A.M. to P.M. and back at one minute after the hour, so as with mic, people let machines tell them how to talk and even think about time.

Perhaps that's a reason so many think the 21st Century began in 2000.

Until now, we've seen only the brilliant staff of American Science and Surplus, a catalog company in Chicago, insist upon correct form and always use mike.  We've always supported them, but now AS&S can point to the authority of the Institute for the Linguistically Impaired.  That should silence any know-nothing critics.

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