a trap for catching and usually killing mice, especially one with a spring bar which snaps down on to the mouse when it touches a piece of cheese or other bait attached to the mechanism.
(also mousetrap cheese) [mass noun]British informal cheese of poor quality.
verb
[with object]North American informal
induce (someone) to do something by means of a trick:the editor mousetrapped her into giving him an article
block (a user’s) efforts to exit from a website, usually one to which they have been redirected.
Phrases
a better mousetrap
an improved version of a well-known article:the people with the better mousetrap will do well
[from ‘If a man ... make a better mouse-trap than his neighbour ... the world will make a beaten path to his door’, attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson]
mousetrap in other Oxford dictionaries
Definition of mousetrap in the US English dictionary
