JargonFile/entries/lurker.txt
2014-04-26 15:52:28 +01:00

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lurker
n. One of the silent majority in an electronic forum; one who posts occasionally or not at all but is known to read the group's postings regularly. This term is not pejorative and indeed is casually used reflexively: Oh, I'm just lurking. Often used in the lurkers , the hypothetical audience for the group's flamage -emitting regulars. When a lurker speaks up for the first time, this is called delurking. The creator of the popular science-fiction TV series Babylon 5 has ties to SF fandom and the hacker culture. In that series, the use of the term lurker for a homeless or displaced person is a conscious reference to the jargon term.