May 15, 2003

dogpile

v.

[Usenet: prob. fr. mainstream puppy pile] When many people post unfriendly responses in short order to a single posting, they are sometimes said to dogpile or dogpile on the person to whom they're responding. For example, when a religious missionary posts a simplistic appeal to alt.atheism, he can expect to be dogpiled. It has been suggested that this derives from U.S. football slang for a tackle involving three or more people; among hackers, it seems at least as likely to derive from an ‘autobiographical’ Bugs Bunny cartoon in which a gang of attacking canines actually yells Dogpile on the rabbit!.

Posted by Jargon File at May 15, 2003 10:50 AM

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