English edit

Etymology edit

chicken +‎ bone +‎ -er, from their supposed diet of fast food.

Noun edit

chickenboner (plural chickenboners)

  1. (Internet slang, derogatory) A small-time spammer.
    • 2004, Danny Goodman, Spam Wars, page 110:
      While leaders of notorious spam gangs tend to be more upscale in their lifestyles, it is believed that many of them rely on numerous "chickenboners" to perform affiliate mailings on behalf of the gangs.
    • 2014, Brian S. McWilliams, Spam Kings:
      With Wallace vanquished, antispammers turned their attention to smaller foes, whom they jokingly referred to as chickenboners. Unlike big operators such as Wallace who incorporated their businesses and maintained office space with hired employees and other trappings of legitimacy, chickenboners were imagined by spam fighters as living in mobile homes with a personal computer on the kitchen table, surrounded by beer cans and buckets of take-out fried chicken.

References edit

  • Usenet newsgroups: [1]