Binomial distribution in VMS

[bi3mw]

Wouldn't the most likely explanation be that whatever system was used resulted in the same distribution as if coins had been tossed, rather than actually tossing 9 coins (or a coin 9 times) before writing a word?

Yes, you are right. After all, we don't know how this distribution came about in the VMS. We can only speculate about that. I was thinking more about the creation of binomially distributed text from normal text.