释义 |
blue box, n. Brit. |bluː ˈbɒks|, U.S. |ˈblu ˌbɑks| [‹ blue adj. + box n.2] 1. Telecomm. An electronic device which generates the tones necessary to open long-distance telephone lines, enabling a user to make illegitimate free calls. Now hist.
1971N.Y. Times 6 May 45 (caption) The ‘blue box’ that was allegedly used to make long-distance calls. 1984N.Y. Times (Nexis) 9 June i, The Manhattan District Attorney's Office said the suspects had placed the calls with electronic devices known as blue boxes. 1991K. Hafner & J. Markoff Cyberpunk i. 18 Named for the colour of the original device, blue boxes were rectangular gadgets that came in a variety of sizes. 1993E. S. Raymond New Hacker's Dict. (ed. 2) 327 A few old-time hackers still phreak casually just to keep their hand in, but most these days have hardly even heard of ‘blue boxes’ or any of the other paraphernalia of the great phreaks of yore. 1995Focus Aug. 13/3 Phreaking started with the ‘blue box’—a homespun gadget that gave access to long-distance lines by mimicking the system tone signal of 2,600 hertz. 2. orig. Canad. A blue plastic box for the collection of recyclable household items as part of a municipal recycling scheme. Freq. attrib., designating such a scheme.
1983Toronto Star 17 Sept. A16/2 They tried out the blue box system for a year with 250 homes in Kitchener and this month they are expanding it to 35,000 homes. 1990Daily Tel. 16 May 9/8 The project's organisers plan to issue each of Cardiff's 110,000 households with a blue box in which paper, glass bottles, tin cans and textiles can be separated before collection. 1994Walkerton (Ontario) Herald Times 29 June a18/2 Just a reminder that corrugated cardboard (ie boxes) must be put in the large blue bins... They will not be accepted in your blue box or normal trash. 2001Edmonton Sun (Electronic ed.) 4 Feb. In Edmonton years ago when the blue-box recycling program was first introduced, there were many citizens welcomed it as the better idea it is. |