livelock

( /li:vĀ“lok/, n.)

   A  situation  in  which  some  critical  stage of a task is unable to
   finish  because its clients perpetually create more work for it to do
   after  they  have  been  serviced  but before it can clear its queue.
   Differs from {deadlock} in that the process is not blocked or waiting
   for  anything,  but has a virtually infinite amount of work to do and
   can never catch up.

[glossary]