[WillowIX]

Originally posted by Vaskez: Pssst, it's not mike, that's short for michael, it's mic i.e. microphone

Pssst, mike can also be used as an abbrevation for microphone.

Originally posted by the Oxford English Dictionary: Colloq. abbrev. of MICROPHONE 1; also attrib. Cf. MIC. 1927 Melody Maker June 579/3, I think it is more that he plays too loudly than that he is too near the ‘mike’. 1928 ADE Let. 7 July (1973) 134 Open the act with a fake microphone all set and adjusted for broadcasting. You come out and talk into the ‘mike’ announcing the name of a fake station in the town..and say you have a very interesting program ahead and then you can read it into the mike. 1937 Daily Herald 16 Feb. 19/6 He is unlikely to be afflicted with ‘mike’ fright, because, in his line, he has found visible audiences in far more truculent mood than will be his unseen Midland Regional listeners. 1939 Evening News 7 Nov. 4/5 To follow the players about, the ‘mike’ is moved across the floor on a long arm called a ‘mike boom’, and its operator is a ‘mike slinger’. 1943 J. B. PRIESTLEY Daylight on Saturday xi. 68 He delighted in entertainment, liked to make his little speech at the mike. 1956 B. HOLLIDAY Lady sings Blues (1973) iii. 38, I got to the mike somehow and grabbed it. 1962 Listener 12 Apr. 656/3 Robert Kee avoided..entangling his mike-cable in the mob. 1971 D. E. WESTLAKE I gave at the Office (1972) 188 ‘I am a soldier’; he said, ‘not a baseball player. No interview.’ Frankly, I think he had mike fright.

A nice history lesson of the word mike is included.