Word Fugitives
Atlantic, The, July, 2006 by Barbara Wallraff
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In March we asked for “a word to describe a kind of typographical error: hitting a function key by mistake while typing on a computer,” thereby causing the computer to “start taking insane actions.” The standard arrangement of computer or typewriter keys is, of course, called qwerty, after the sequence of letters at the upper left of the keyboard.
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Hence Thomas Fowler, of Lake Jackson, Texas, wrote, “When you accidentally hit a function key while typing on a computer, it almost always makes the computer behave disqwertyously.” Susan Chilton, of Kitchener, Ontario, suggested the term qwer-key keyboarding, and Amanda Petrucelli, of Plymouth, Ind., qwertastrophe. Computers assign numerical values to letters following the American Standard Code for Information Interchange, or ASCII. Hence John Ciccarelli, of Palo Alto, Calif., wrote, “Ah, you mean when everything you type from then on looks somehow asciiew, causing a feeling of disqwertytude? I believe the term ...
