100 lobsters

There were only 100 words. An old word had to be retired every time somebody used a new one. Things got difficult as the people multiplied, and with them, their names. Eventually all the men were limited to "David" and "Michael" and the women to "Jennifer" and "Kathy".

Technical vocabulary was a problem. They used circumlocutions compounded from simple words. It might be supposed that the banishment of jargon made specialists' language easier to understand, but not so.

Everyone was happy when the upgrade came down the wire, and the static arrays in their heads were replaced with linked lists.