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Posted by Fall Guy from pool0022.cvx40-bradley.dialup.earthlink.net (216.244.42.22) on Thursday, November 22, 2001 at 3:42pm :

In Reply to: I may have celebrated Thanksgiving last month, but.... posted by Brett Maverick Lambert from aig65386y28se.ab.hsia.telus.net (142.59.129.8) on Thursday, November 22, 2001 at 2:29pm :

The origin of spam:
Spam
This word for off-topic commercial posts to usenet message boards or unsolicited commercial e-mail is of uncertain origin, although there is a commonly accepted explanation that is probably correct.

The original Spam was coined in 1937 by the Hormel corporation as a name for its potted meat product. This brand name is a blend of spiced ham.

From there, the transition from meat product to internet term has a stop with Monty Python's Flying Circus. In 1970, that BBC comedy show aired a sketch that featured a cafe that had a menu that featured items like "egg, bacon, and spam;" "egg, bacon, sausage, and spam;" " spam, bacon, sausage, and spam;" "spam, egg, spam, spam, bacon, and spam;" and finally "lobster thermidor aux crevettes with a mornay sauce garnished with truffle pate, brandy, and a fried egg on top and spam." To make matters sillier, the cafe was filled with Vikings who periodically break out into song praising Spam: "Spam, spam, spam, spam ... lovely spam, wonderful spam ..."

Computer people adopted the term from the Python sketch to mean overrunning a fixed-sized buffer with too much data, in other words the data was like the Spam in the sketch, something excessive and undesirable. With the commercialization of the internet, the term expanded to include the unwanted commercial messages and that became the primary meaning.
There are two common alternate explanations that are certainly false. The first is that it refers to a quality of the meat product such that when you throw it at a wall, most of it bounces off, but a little sticks--much like commercial spam, most of which is deleted but some is answered. While this is no more silly than the Monty Python explanation, it does not jibe with the original computer sense of overloading a buffer. The second false explanation is that the computer spam is an acronym of some sort, but seldom is any acronym proferred to explain it.

PS: A forum is a fixed-size buffer? Bwee hee hee!
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wordorigins.org Follow Ups: Post a Followup Name: E-Mail: ( default ) Subject: Message: : The origin of spam: : <i>Spam : This word for off-topic commercial posts to usenet message boards or unsolicited commercial e-mail is of uncertain origin, although there is a commonly accepted explanation that is probably correct. : The original Spam was coined in 1937 by the Hormel corporation as a name for its potted meat product. This brand name is a blend of spiced ham. : From there, the transition from meat product to internet term has a stop with Monty Python's Flying Circus. In 1970, that BBC comedy show aired a sketch that featured a cafe that had a menu that featured items like "egg, bacon, and spam;" "egg, bacon, sausage, and spam;" " spam, bacon, sausage, and spam;" "spam, egg, spam, spam, bacon, and spam;" and finally "lobster thermidor aux crevettes with a mornay sauce garnished with truffle pate, brandy, and a fried egg on top and spam." To make matters sillier, the cafe was filled with Vikings who periodically break out into song praising Spam: "Spam, spam, spam, spam ... lovely spam, wonderful spam ..." : Computer people adopted the term from the Python sketch to mean overrunning a fixed-sized buffer with too much data, in other words the data was like the Spam in the sketch, something excessive and undesirable. With the commercialization of the internet, the term expanded to include the unwanted commercial messages and that became the primary meaning. : There are two common alternate explanations that are certainly false. The first is that it refers to a quality of the meat product such that when you throw it at a wall, most of it bounces off, but a little sticks--much like commercial spam, most of which is deleted but some is answered. While this is no more silly than the Monty Python explanation, it does not jibe with the original computer sense of overloading a buffer. The second false explanation is that the computer spam is an acronym of some sort, but seldom is any acronym proferred to explain it. </i> : PS: A forum is a fixed-size buffer? Bwee hee hee! : : : : Optional Link ( default ) URL: Title: Optional Image Link ( default ) URL: This board is powered by the Mr. Fong Device from Cyberarmy.com