Spamming

How to spell spamming

8 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce spamming

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does spamming mean?

1. verbSending the same unwanted message, often advertising, to large numbers of people electronically.
2. verbPressing a button or sending an action repeatedly and rapidly, especially in video games or chat.

Spamming in a sentence

• The company was fined for spamming thousands of customers with adverts.

• Spamming the same key during the match slowed his computer to a crawl.

• Spamming a public forum with sales links will get an account banned.

• The moderator warned players against spamming the chat with emojis.

Where does spamming come from?

Language of origin: Other

This word traces back to SPAM, the canned spiced ham launched by the American company Hormel in 1937; the brand name is widely understood to be a blend of 'spiced' and 'ham'. The modern computing sense owes its life to a 1970 Monty Python sketch in which a cafe menu repeats the word 'spam' so relentlessly that it drowns out all conversation. Early users of online chat systems and newsgroups borrowed that image of mindless, swamping repetition, and by the early 1990s 'spam' had become the standard term for flooding people with unwanted messages. From the noun came the verb 'to spam', and 'spamming' is its present participle, describing the act of sending such junk. The spelling trap lives in the ending: because 'spam' is a single short syllable ending in one 'm' after a stressed vowel, that 'm' doubles before -ing, giving 'spamming' rather than the tempting but wrong 'spaming'.

How the word is built

• spam (origin as a brand blend of 'spiced ham', later internet slang)
• -m- (consonant doubled after a short stressed vowel)
• -ing (present participle/gerund)