Yiddish for "little bit of junk," and originally used to refer to things like party favors, this word saw frequent use during the
dot-com era as the term for the little
freebies that dot-coms might send to would-be customers or journalists to try to evoke
name recognition or favorable reviews. Chotchkes could range from the commonplace--ballpoint pens, magnifying glasses, and so on--to the bizarre; there was an interesting and amusing article in
Salon Magazine about the various freebies they received from
Internet businesses, most of whom were not still
in business by the time the article was written.
If dot-coms had poured all the money they spent on chotchkes into showing a profit instead, the dot-com crash might possibly have been averted.