Reply #21: Punching a hole was to write-protect an 8" floppy

[jmowreader]

5.25" floppies came with the hole and a little sheet of silver labels to cover the holes up--the covering was what write-protected 5.25" floppies.

If you had a 5.25" floppy puncher you probably also had an Apple. I remember we used to punch a hole in those so we could turn 'em over and use the back side too, because at five dollars for less than 200k of storage, those little bastards were expensive!