To write a software or document distribution on magnetic tape for
shipment. Has nothing to do with physically cutting the medium! Early
versions of this lexicon claimed that one never analogously speaks of
‘cutting a disk’, but this has since been reported as live
usage. Related slang usages are mainstream business's ‘cut a
check’, the recording industry's ‘cut a record’, and the
military's ‘cut an order’.
All of these usages reflect physical processes in obsolete recording
and duplication technologies. The first stage in manufacturing an
old-style vinyl record involved cutting grooves in a stamping die with a
precision lathe. More mundanely, the dominant technology for mass
duplication of paper documents in pre-photocopying days involved
“cutting a stencil”, punching away portions of the wax overlay
on a silk screen. More directly, paper tape with holes punched in it was
an important early storage medium. See also
burn a CD.
