Push media

A model of media distribution where items of content are sent to the user (viewer, listener, etc.) in a sequence, and at a rate, determined by a server to which the user has connected. This contrasts with pull media where the user requests each item individually. Push media usually entail some notion of a "channel" which the user selects and which delivers a particular kind of content. Broadcast television is (for the most part) the prototypical example of push media: you turn on the TV set, select a channel and shows and commercials stream out until you turn the set off. By contrast, the web is (mostly) the prototypical example of pull media: each "page", each bit of content, comes to the user only if he requests it; put down the keyboard and the mouse, and everything stops. As part of the eternal desire to apply a fun new words to boring old things, "push" is occasionally used to mean nothing more than email spam.

Free Online Dictionary of Computing