What exactly does "ping" mean?

[LostInAnomie]

Relieve me of my ignorance. Every time someone posts some crap from the FR it almost never fails to have at least one post with the word "ping" in it. What exactly does it mean and why do they do it so often?

[Redneck Socialist]

Their version of "kick" maybe?

Don't really know, haven't gone there in a while. :shrug:

[GirlinContempt]

1. urbandictionary

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=ping

[Az]

2. Well originally

It is a single pulse of sound used to determine distance to objects. Often used by submarines.

Later with the arrival of networks it became a term for sending a single packet out on the network and timing its journey to and from the target.

The freepers and others use it as a kind of alert system. Whenever a topic of interest to individuals in a particular group comes up a ping is sent out and they get messages about it.