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A kill file (also killfile, bozo bin or twit list) is a computer file that stores text matching patterns that are used in some Usenet reading programs to filter out (ignore) articles by subject, author, or other header information. Adding a pattern to a kill file results in matching articles being ignored by the end user using the newsreader. By extension, the term may describe a decision to ignore an author or topic. A kill file feature was first implemented in Larry Wall's rn.
An ignore list is a similar yet simpler feature found in some web-based forums, including some web-based Usenet portals, which filters out posts by author only.
Scoring is a more advanced feature found in some newsreaders, including Gnus. The newsreader uses fuzzy logic to apply arbitrarily complex overlapping rules, stored in score files, to score articles. An article is ignored when its score is below a user-defined threshold. For example, articles might score as ignored (killed) if it violates too many low-weighted stylistic rules (e.g. containing too many or too little punctuation, implying an annoying reading experience), or only one or two highly-weighted rules (such as the body containing objectionable keywords or the origin being a known source of spamming).
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