black hole: n.,vt. [common] What data (a piece of email or
netnews, or a stream of TCP/IP packets) has fallen into if it
disappears mysteriously between its origin and destination sites
(that is, without returning a bounce message). "I think there's a
black hole at foovax!" conveys suspicion that site foovax has been
dropping a lot of stuff on the floor lately (see drop on the
floor). The implied metaphor of email as interstellar travel is
interesting in itself. Readily verbed as `blackhole': "That router
is blackholing IDP packets." Compare bit bucket aand see RBL.
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