hug of death
The term "hug of death" is often used in the context of the internet and technology to describe situations where excessive attention or traffic causes a service to fail.
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Definition
C1Internet
(informal, metaphorical)A situation where a website or service becomes overwhelmed and temporarily unavailable due to a sudden spike in traffic.
Example
- The small blog experienced a hug of death after being featured on the front page of Reddit.
C2Business
(informal, metaphorical)A scenario where a larger company's offer to acquire a smaller company leads to the smaller company's decline.
Example
- The startup faced a hug of death when the tech giant's acquisition offer caused internal turmoil.
C1General
(informal, metaphorical)An attempt to help or support that ultimately causes harm or failure.
Example
- His well-meaning advice turned out to be a hug of death for the project.
Similar
Terms that have similar or relatively close meanings to "hug of death":