Compression
Etymology
From Latin "comprimere," to press together. Data compression presses out redundancy — the repetition and predictability hidden in files — so the same information takes fewer bits. The concept was formalized alongside information theory in the mid-20th century, which set the mathematical limit on how far anything can be losslessly squeezed.
noun · /kum-PRESH-un/
Shrinking a file’s size by encoding its information more efficiently.
What it names
The trick that makes streaming, video calls, and phone photos possible — squeezing huge data through limited pipes.
Example
Heavy compression let the two-hour film stream smoothly over a weak connection.
Related idea
Lossless compression restores the original exactly, while "lossy" compression — used for most photos, music, and video — permanently discards detail the eye or ear is unlikely to miss, which is why a re-saved JPEG slowly degrades.