Word: pica
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Dates: during 1981-1981
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...page. The room containing the printer was an antiseptic prison vibrating with the sounds of the air conditioner and the computer. Periodically the curses of a frustrated zombie rose above the hum because the printer's fragile filament got tangled or the computer swallowed a line or paragraph. The pica mechanism finally refused to work at all, and every page had to be written in tiny elite type. It was a thesis-padder's nightmare. In the terminal room, grad students, government and economics concentrators hunched over the displays, ever-conscious of the vultures peering over their shoulders and none...