kill file

File of words and regexps used to filter out spam and losers while reading Usenet news. Many people prefer score files like the ones used in gnus.

Usually screens unwanted messages in a USENET newsgroup, but has been used for many other things, like e-mail.

When someone lands in your killfile, they may make a *plonk* noise.

kick = K = killer app

kill file n.

[Usenet; very common] (alt. `KILL file') Per-user file(s) used by some Usenet reading programs (originally Larry Wall's rn(1)) to discard summarily (without presenting for reading) articles matching some particularly uninteresting (or unwanted) patterns of subject, author, or other header lines. Thus to add a person (or subject) to one's kill file is to arrange for that person to be ignored by one's newsreader in future. By extension, it may be used for a decision to ignore the person or subject in other media. See also plonk.

--The Jargon File version 4.3.1, ed. ESR, autonoded by rescdsk.