In online culture, the use of phrasal formulas or templates known as snowclones, phrases adapted for reuse through the change of some of its elements, is widespread. These “multi-use, customizable, instantly recognizable, time-worn, quoted or misquoted phrase[s] or sentence[s] (…) can be used in an entirely open array of different variants” (Pullum, 2003).
The term derives from the journalese expression “If Eskimos have N words for snow, X surely have M words for Y.” As it was first presented, the term applied to “adaptable cliche frames for lazy journalists” (Pullum, 2004), but that is certainly not their only use: there are many familiar variants that we apply in our everyday lives, such as the Shakespearean ‘to X or not to X’, and Saddam Hussein’s ominous ‘the mother of all X’.