--- Forwarded Message from "Dente, Ed" <[log in to unmask]> ---

>From: "Dente, Ed" <[log in to unmask]>
>To: "'Language Learning and Technology International Information Forum'"     <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: RE: #7142.8 Tracking software (!)
>Date: Tue, 3 Jun 2003 14:41:32 -0400

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> 
> Ditto machines were a major improvement.  When you typed, the purple
> (or even other colors) material was pressed onto the ditto master...
> kind of like a glob of dry ink in the shape of letters that then
> transferred to regular paper copies by means of the spirit fluid (that
> good smelling stuff!).  Some of us got to be really good with 
> an Exacto
> knife to "carve" correct letters from mistakes on the masters.
> 
> The only problem was that students could tell if you were
> procrastinating... hard to quickly get rid of the spirit smell.
> 
> The current generation of techies missed out on real fun (not!)... I
> don't mind relegating the "good old days" to a distant memory.
 

In the mid-'80s when one of my assistants laughed at our "obsolete"
mimeo/ditto machines I gently reminded her that Lenin had made the entire
Russian Revolution with one of these guys* (however, not, I think, with one
of ours, although I suppose it was possible), so she should be more
respectful of the technology.
 She still laughed.
(*Edison invented the mimeograph machine in 1875, so they were long in
service by then.)
Ed
     "If you want to call me that, smile."
                     -Gary Cooper, <<The Virginian>>