John wrote on Sun, 21 Oct 2007 13:05:09 -0700:

JM Robert Haar wrote:
?? On 10/21/07 3:01 PM, "William Sommerwerck"
?? wrote:
??
?? Where in world did you come up with duck? One doesn't
?? tape ducks; one tapes ducts. Except it isn't very good
?? for that...
?? So why the latter?
??
?? It might originally have been called duck tape. See the
?? Etymology section of the Wikipedia article.
??
?? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duct_tape
??
?? The issue is confusing, because it wasn't used for ducts
?? until long after it was invented.
??
?? And what is worse is that the stuff commonly called "duct
?? tape" - fabric tape with a silvery but non-metallic
?? coating is actually a very bad choice for sealing ducts.
?? There are varieties of tape that are made for
?? sealing ducts but the common "duct" tape is not one of
?? them.
??
?? I am surprised that no one has mentioned gaffers tape.

JM Gaffer's tape is mentioned in the Wiki article, and it's
JM mentioned in the first line that duct tape ain't so good
JM for ducts.

Despite Wikipedia, I think we should stick to photography :-)
I'm not sure whether we are talking about the same thing!

James Silverton
Potomac, Maryland

E-mail, with obvious alterations:
not.jim.silverton.at.verizon.not