Paper Cut

Noun · Slang & Abbreviations

Definitions

  1. A small but irritating problem that hurts more than its size suggests, especially when many of them accumulate. In engineering slang, paper cuts are the tiny UX or workflow annoyances that quietly drain energy every day.

    In plain English: A small irritating problem that becomes significant through repetition.

    Example: "The setup flow was full of paper cuts, none fatal alone but collectively enough to make every new contributor feel the project was rougher than it needed to be."

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