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Re: Why does the meaning (and spelling) of words change?

From:Andreas Johansson <andjo@...>
Date:Monday, April 19, 2004, 18:36
Quoting "Mark J. Reed" <markjreed@...>:

> On Mon, Apr 19, 2004 at 06:08:36PM +0100, Joe wrote: > > [The word] 'programme' is in normal, commonwealth English usage. > > 'Computer programme' is as wrong as 'floppy disc'. > > Just so. I still haven't figured out why the usual spellings are > "floppy disk" and "hard disk" but "compact disc" and > "digital versatile disc". True, "floppy disk" could come from the fact > that it's short for "floppy diskette" and there's no such spelling as > "discette", but that doesn't explain hard disks, or the choice of > "disc" (which is not the usual spelling in GAE) for optical media.
IIRC, the first time I needed to use the word "diskette" in English, I didn't know the English spelling (the Swedish one is _diskett_), so I tried "disquette". I still find the real one boring in comparison. Andreas