thread

n. [Usenet, GEnie, CompuServe] Common abbreviation of topic thread , a more
or less continuous chain of postings on a single topic. To follow a thread
is to read a series of Usenet postings sharing a common subject or (more
correctly) which are connected by Reference headers. The better newsreaders
can present news in thread order automatically. Not to be confused with the
techspeak sense of thread , e.g. a lightweight process. Interestingly, this
is far from a neologism. The OED says: That which connects the successive
points in anything, esp.