History

It is difficult to be precise about "dynamic web page beginnings" or chronology, because the precise concept makes sense only after the "widespread development of web pages": HTTP has been in use since 1990,HTML, as standard, since 1996. The web browsers explosion started with 1993's Mosaic. It is obvious, however, that the concept of dynamically driven websites predates the internet, and in fact HTML. For example, in 1990, before the general public use of the internet, a dynamically driven remotely accessed menu system was implemented by Susan Biddlecomb, at the University of Southern California BBS on a 16 line TBBS system with TDBS add-on.

Disadvantages

Search engines work by creating indexes of published HTML web pages that were, initially, "static". With the advent of dynamic web pages, often created from a private database, the content is less visible^[2]. Unless this content is duplicated in some way (for example, as a series of extra static pages on the same site), a search may not find the information it is looking for. It is unreasonable to expect generalizedweb search engines to be able to access complex database structures, some of which in any case may be secure.

Server-side scripting and content creation

A program running on the web server (server-side scripting) is used to change the web content on various web pages, or to adjust the sequence of or reload of the web pages. Server responses may be determined by such conditions as data in a posted HTML form, parameters in the URL, the type of browser being used, the passage of time, or a database or server state.

Such web pages are often created with the help of server-side languages such as ASP, ColdFusion, Perl, PHP, and other languages. These server-side languages often use the Common Gateway Interface (CGI) to produce dynamic web pages. Two notable exceptions are ASP.NET and JSP, which reuse CGI concepts in their APIs but actually dispatch all web requests into a shared virtual machine.

Server-side dynamic pages can also use the first kind of dynamic content on the client side.

While VM-based server-side languages and CGI would be preferred for new development, some web-servers also support Server Side Includes (typically for a file extension such as .shtml), and Jhtml was a Java server-side technology developed before JSP.

Client-side scripting and content creation

Using client-side scripting to change interface behaviors within a specific web page, in response to mouse or keyboard actions or at specified timing events. In this case the dynamic behavior occurs within thepresentation.

Such web pages use presentation technology called rich interfaced pages. Client-side scripting languages like JavaScript or ActionScript, used for Dynamic HTML (DHTML) and Flash technologies respectively, are frequently used to orchestrate media types (sound, animations, changing text, etc.) of the presentation. The scripting also allows use of remote scripting, a technique by which the DHTML page requests additional information from a server, using a hidden Frame, XMLHttpRequests, or a Web service.

The Client-side content is generated on the user's computer. The web browser retrieves a page from the server, then processes the code embedded in the page (often written in JavaScript) and displays the retrieved page's content to the user.

The innerHTML property (or write command) can illustrate the client-side dynamic page generation: two distinct pages, A and B, can be regenerated as document.innerHTML = A and document.innerHTML = B; or "on load dynamic" by document.write(A) and document.write(B).

There are also some utilities and frameworks for converting HTML files into JavaScript files. For example webJS^[1] uses innerHTML property for rendering pages from converted HTML on client-side.

The first "widespread used" version of JavaScript was 1996 (with Netscape 3 an ECMAscript standard).

Properties associated with dynamic web pages

Classical hypertext navigation occurs among "static" documents, and, for web users, this experience is reproduced using static web pages, meaning that a page retrieved by different users at different times is always the same, in the same form.

However, a web page can also provide a live user experience. Content (text, images, form fields, etc.) on a web page can change in response to different contexts or conditions. In dynamic sites, page content and page layout are created separately. The content is retrieved from a database and is placed on a web page only when needed or asked. This allows for quicker page loading, and it allows just about anyone with limited web design experience to update their own website via an administrative tool. This set-up is ideal for those who wish to make frequent changes to their websites including text and image updates, e.g. e-commerce.

Dynamic web page

A dynamic web page is a kind of web page that has been prepared with fresh information (content and/or layout), for each individual viewing. It is not static because it changes with the time (e.g. news content), the user (e.g. preferences in a login session), the user interaction (e.g. web page game), the context (e.g. parametric customization), or any combination thereof.

Digital marketing

Digital Marketing is the promoting of brands using all forms of digital advertising channels to reach consumers. This now includes Television, Radio, Internet, mobile,social media marketing and any other form of digital media.

Whilst digital marketing does include many of the techniques and practices contained within the category of Internet Marketing, it extends beyond this by including other channels with which to reach people that do not require the use of The Internet. As a result of this non-reliance on the Internet, the field of digital marketing includes a whole host of elements such as mobile phones, sms/mms, display / banner ads and digital outdoor.

Previously seen as a stand-alone service in its own right, it is frequently being seen as a domain that can and does cover most, if not all, of the more traditional marketing areas such as Direct Marketing by providing the same method of communicating with an audience but in a digital fashion. Digital is now being broadened to support the "servicing" and "engagement" of customers.

Research

Because of their recent appearance on the Web, content farms have not yet received a lot of explicit attention from the research community. The model of hiring cheap freelancers to produce content was first discussed as an alternative strategy to generating fake content automatically, together with an example of the infrastructure necessary to make it profitable through online ads, and techniques to detect social spam that promotes such content.^[2]

While not explicitly motivated by content farms, there has been recent interest in the automatic categorisation of web sites according to the quality of their content. ^[15][16] A detailed study on the application of these methods to the identification of content farm pages is yet to be done.

Google reaction

In one of Google's promotional videos for search published in the summer of 2010, the majority of the links available were reported to be produced at content farms.^[12] In late February, 2011, Google announced it was adjusting search algorithms significantly to "provide better rankings for high-quality sites—sites with original content and information such as research, in-depth reports, thoughtful analysis and so on."^[13] This was reported to be a reaction to content farms and an attempt to reduce their effectiveness in manipulating search result rankings.^[14]

Criticisms

Critics allege that content farms provide relatively low quality content,^[7] and that they maximize profit by producing "just good enough" material rather than high-quality articles.^[8] Articles are usually composed by human writers rather than automated processes, but they may not be written by a specialist in the subjects reported. Some authors working for sites identified as content farms have admitted knowing little about the fields on which they report.^[9] Search engines see content farms as a problem, as they tend to bring the user to less relevant and lower quality results of the search.^[10] The reduced quality and rapid creation of articles on such sites has drawn comparisons to the fast food industry^[11] and to pollution^[2]:

“

Information consumers end up with less relevant or valuable resources. Producers of relevant resources receive less cash as a reward (lower clickthrough rate) while producers of junk receive more cash. One way to describe this is pollution. Virtual junk pollutes the Web environment by adding noise. Everybody but the polluters pays a price for Web pollution: search engines work less well, users waste precious time and attention on junk sites, and honest publishers lose income. The polluter spoils the Web environment for everybody else.

Characteristics

Some sites labeled as content farms may contain a large number of articles and have been valued in the millions of dollars. Demand Media is projected to be publishing 1 million items a month, the equivalent of four English-language Wikipedias a year.^[4] Another site, Associated Content, was purchased in May 2010 by Yahoo! for $90 million.^[5]

Pay scales for content are low compared to traditional salaries received by copy editors. One company compensated writers at a rate of $3.50 per article. Such rates are substantially lower than what a typical copy editor might receive; however, some content farm contributors produce many articles per day and may earn enough for a living income. It has been reported that content writers are often educated women with children seeking supplemental income while working at home.^[6]

Content farm

In the context of the World Wide Web, the term content farm is used to describe a company that employs large numbers of often freelance writers to generate large amounts of textual content which is specifically designed to satisfy algorithms for maximal retrieval by automated search engines. Their main goal is to generate advertising revenue through attracting reader page views^[1] as first exposed in the context of social spam.^[2]

Articles in content farms have been found to contain identical passages across several media sources, leading to questions about the sites placing search engine optimization goals over factual relevance.^[3]Proponents of the content farms claim that from a business perspective, traditional journalism is inefficient.^[1] Content farms often commission their writers' work based on analysis of search engine queries^[1] that proponents represent as "true market demand", a feature that traditional journalism lacks.^[1]

Technological effects on content

Media production and delivery technology may potentially enhance the value of content by formatting, filtering and combining original sources of content for new audiences with new contexts. The greatest value for a given source of content for a specific audience is often found through such electronic reworking of content as dynamic and real-time as the trends that fuel its interest. Less emphasis on value from content stored for possible use in its original form, and more emphasis on rapid repurposing, reuse, and redeployment has led many publishers and media producers to view their primary function less as originators and more as transformers of content. Thus, one finds out that institutions, that used to focus on publishing printed materials, now publishing both databases and software to combine content from various sources for a wider-variety of audiences.

Content value

The author, producer or publisher of an original source of information or experiences may or may not be directly responsible for the entire value that they attain as content in a specific context. For example, part of an original article (such as a headline from a news story) may be rendered on another web page displaying the results of a user's search engine query grouped with headlines from other news publications and related advertisements. The value that the original headline has in this group of query results may be very different from the value that it had in its original article.
It is possible for a person to derive their own value from content in ways that the author didn't plan or imagine. User innovation makes it possible for users to develop their own content from existing content.
Not all information content requires creative authoring or editing. Through recent technological developments such as mobile phones and automated sensors that can record events anywhere for publishing and converting to potentially reach a global audience on channels such as YouTube, most recorded or transmitted information and experiences, can be deemed content.

Terminology

The word "content" is often used colloquially to refer to media. However, content is more accurately used as a specific term in that it means the content of the medium rather than the medium itself. Likewise, the single word "media" and some compound words that include "media" (e.g. multimedia, hypermedia) are instead referring to a type of content. An example of a type of content commonly referred to as a type of media is a "motion picture" referred to as "a film." The distinction between medium and content is less clear when referring to interactive elements that contain information and are then contained in interactive media, such as dice contained in board games or GUI widgets contained in software.

Content (media)

In media production and publishing, content is information and experiences that may provide value for an end-user/audience in specific contexts. Content may be delivered via any medium such as the internet, television, and audio CDs, as well as live events such as conferences and stage performances. The word is used to identify and quantify various formats and genres of information as manageable value-adding components of media.

Morgen (mythological creature)

Morgens, Morgans or Mari-Morgans are Welsh and Breton water spirits that drown men. They may lure men to their death by their own sylphic beauty, or with glimpses of underwater gardens with buildings of gold or crystal. They are also blamed for heavy flooding that destroys crops or villages. In the story of the drowning of Ys, a city in Brittany, the king's daughter, Dahut, is the cause, and she becomes a sea morgen.

The morgens are eternally young, and like sirens they sit in the water and comb their hair seductively.^[1] In Arthurian legend, particularly Geoffrey of Monmouth's Vita Merlini, the ruler of Avalon is referred to as "Morgen".^[2] As such, the origin of Morgan le Fay may be connected to these Breton myths.^[3]

Tales of morgens are preserved in the British countryside, even some parts of South West England, like the one from western Somerset, where a fisherman adopts an infant morgen, only to have her revert to the sea when she grows up.^[4]

Conspiracy theories and doctrines

The connection between ethereal beings and man also comes from popular conspiracy theories, such as The Invisibles, a comic book series by Grant Morrison that was said be intended as a hypersigil,^[188] as well as from esoteric philosophies,^[156] where the plot would be the deviation of man’s sense of reality, and the obstruction of his spiritual development^[189] by some ethereal creatures.^[190]

Writers like Castaneda corroborate that sense unveiling certain type of ethereal beings as manipulators and parasites of the human mind.^[191] He declares that they control the whole life of a human being.^[192] As expounded by Castaneda, perception, thoughts and emotions are alien events restraining what a man realizes. To achieve such prowess, the ethereal being transfers his own alien mind to the young human.^[81][193] For that reason the human ego actually is an alien self and the reality sought by men is untruth, is not the universe as fact. Victim of that catastrophic situation, the only chance to escape from that, would be an entire life of breaking off thoughts discipline and other techniques. However for governing a human, at some moment there must be an agreement between the parts because according to him as well as other occultist authors, the “world of the ethereal beings” does not know lies but recognizes humans. The first word spoken is sacred, it is a final act, and thus regrets are useless.^[125] Nevertheless this does not mean that ruses could not be done by it.^[69][191]

Besides involving ghostly creatures such as familiars and demons, western magic tradition deposits such mental practice of ceasing the internal mental dialogue as well a requisite in the path for becoming a magician.

In the Buddhist Tradition certain philosophic parallels concerning such discipline, also are found.^{[191][194][195]} The Dhyāna, the meditation practice where thoughts are canceled, would be a major factor to free the man of his Samsara strands and became an enlightened Buddha.^[196][197]

The psychic death of ego and the annulment of desires, that in turn provide from self-image, as well would be key elements to man understand Maya, that in Sanskrit means world of illusions.^[198][199] The "non-self", the anatman, the teaching that none of the things perceived by the senses constitute a "self", represents a commitment of most Buddhist doctrines.^[200] As for the sense of reality, there are variations in Tibetan Buddhism, but as clarified by school of Dzogchen, all perceived reality is totally unreal.^[201]

Buddhism professes the existence of a myriad of ethereal entities pictured as demons or “angry gods”, which are accrued in the human psyche and must be overcome during the process of death to achieve theenlightenment.^[202] Many teachings in Buddhism aim to face the death and fight against these creatures to achieve the freedom of human soul. A Buddhist doctrine altogether dedicated to that is Death yoga, one of the Tantra techniques in Vajrayana. That theme is very explored in the Tibetan texts written around the 8th century A.D., of the Bardo Thodol or The Liberation Through Hearing During The Intermediate State(Tibetan: bardo “liminality”; thodol as “liberation”) more known in Occident as “The Tibetan book of dead”.^[51]

Dweller on the Threshold by Arthur Bowen Davies, circa 1915.

Armenian writer George Gurdjieff claimed that mankind does not really sense the reality. According to Gurdjieff, people could not perceive reality in their current states because they do not possess consciousness but rather live in a state of a hypnotic "waking sleep".^[191] He declares: "Man lives his life in sleep, and in sleep he dies". The author, born in 19th century, at that time was considered polemic but succeeded to settle his school, also known as "the Fourth Way", teaching his esoteric techniques of "awakening". The best legacy of his work, probably is represented by work of the philosopher P. D. Ouspensky, In Search of the Miraculous.^[203]

The reality question according to theosophist Bailey, displays a dual sight, which she describes it as the necessary and holy work by devas of one side, while on the other hand it indicates such work as rightly charming the humanity. Men became slaves of what she calls “the compelling glamour of Maya”.^[189]

Inasmuch, progresses Bailey, there is the problematic control exerted by some elementals in human constitution. These elementals, which she calls "lunar lords", naturally build the own human essence. The lunar lords have own existence and power, however they are in an “involutionary arc” aggregating and arresting the human being under a world of forms. Virtually they are intelligences escorted by their will. When the lunar lords deploy a predominant command they transform themselves in the “lower personality”. In view of that fact, as a single being, “he” is a power directing the body’s energies for feeding himself in all the three basic levels: physical, astral and mental. The man must constantly hear the “formless” voice coming from “real man” for finding the deliverance from that bondage, for accomplishing the realization of this world of form.^[204]

Another opposing entity it is the “Dweller on the Threshold”, who only affects persons already in the path to knowledge, the initiates.^[190] What the dweller comes to be, it is not clear to most esoteric schools, outlines Bailey, but effectively it is a huge and potent thoughtform, an elemental embodying vital, astral and mental energy, a force blocking the initiated progress that must be dissipated.^[135]

The “dweller” can be determined as all lower features marked in the human personality; he shifts the consciousness into a delusional and sensorial realm; he defies the human soul; he leads to the past intrinsically accompanied by its limitations and wicked addictions; he induces a fanatic mind and whilst in his worst manifestation causes mental insanity, asserts Bayley.^{[135][189][190]}

Concerning artistic expressions, stands out the mystic painting “The Dweller in the Innermost” by George Frederic Watts, which as well inspired the English Walter Crane to write the sonnet:

The Dweller in the Innermostby George Frederic Watts, 1885-6.

Star-steadfast eyes that pierce the smouldering haze
Of Life and Thought, whose fires prismatic fuse
The palpitating mists with magic hues
That stain the glass of Being, as we gaze,
And mark in transit every mood and phase,
Which, sensitive, doth take or doth refuse
The Lights and shadows Time and Love confuse,

When, lost in dreams, we thread their wandering maze.
Fledged, too, art thou with plumes on brow and breast
To bear thee, brooding o'er the depths unknown
Of human strife, and wonder, and desire;
And silence, wakened by thy horn alone,
Behind thy veil behold a heart on fire,
Wrapped in the secret of its own unrest.

—Walter Crane, 1907.^[205]

A precursor of this theme at Victorian era was the English writer Edward Bulwer-Lytton who in his mystical romance Zanoni phrased the expression “Dweller of the Threshold” for representing an mighty entity opposing those in the way for the occult world:

The Kiss of the Sphinx by Franz von Stuck, 1895.

Its form was veiled as the face, but the outline was that of a female;
yet it moved not as move even the ghosts that simulate the living.
It seemed rather to crawl as some vast misshapen reptile; and
pausing, at length it cowered beside the table which held the mystic
volume, and again fixed its eyes through the filmy veil on the rash
invoker.

All fancies, the most grotesque, of monk or painter in the
early North, would have failed to give to the visage of imp or fiend
that aspect of deadly malignity which spoke to the shuddering
nature in those eyes alone. All else so dark, —shrouded, veiled and
larva-like. But that burning glare so intense, so livid, yet so living,
had in it something that was almost HUMAN in its passion of hate
and mockery, something that served to show that the shadowy
Horror was not all a spirit, but partook of matter enough, at least,
to make it more deadly and fearful an enemy to material forms. As,
clinging with the grasp of agony to the wall, his hair erect, his
eyeballs starting, he still gazed back upon that appalling gaze,
—the Image spoke to him: his soul rather than his ear comprehended
the words it said.

Thou hast entered the immeasurable region. I am the Dweller of the
Threshold. What wouldst thou with me? Silent? Dost thou fear me?
Am I not thy beloved? Is it not for me that thou hast rendered up
The delights of thy race? Wouldst thou be wise? Mine is the
wisdom of the countless ages. Kiss me, my mortal lover.

—Bulwer-Lytton, 1842.^[206]

The characteristics of the ethereal dweller also were considered by authors such as the British Dion Fortune,^[207] Russian H. P. Blavatsky,^[208] and the Austrian-Hungarian Rudolf Steiner.^[209] Steiner, amidst his studies, claims the existence of two dwellers, a “lesser and a greater guardian on the threshold”, and he and also Blavatsky corroborate the description made by Bulwer-Lytton's Zanoni to the dweller. According to Steiner the dweller originates from man as an independent intelligence and no longer destructible.

Dion Fortune compares the dweller with the mythological riddle of the Sphinx blocking the way of men, which in the legend confronts the man with the threat: “decipher me or I will devour you”.^[207] In current theosophic lines, the dweller is rendered as a being made of astral remnants originated from present and past lives of the man, whichever are bound by desires and terrene aspirations.^[32] Additionally, other possible origin to the dweller is taken under an psychological approach, which regard it actually not as a proper entity but a resistance built by sum of mind’s wishes for not abandoning the familiar and mundane ambitions of the ordinary man.^[32]

The man for some esoteric traditions unconsciously bypasses his whole life as if asleep. Sleeping beauty by John Collier, 1921.

As delineated by gnostic author Samael Aun Weor the mind lives continuously reacting against the impact of the outside world. These feedbacks of appreciation depart from a demonic mental entity. This creature is the Guardian of the threshold of the human mental body . This mental custodian enslaves the mind of all human beings.^[156]

Violence, desires and passions, hatred, bitterness, egoism, wrath, envy, and slander are responses coming from the mental keeper, claims Weor. The body of wishes is nothing else but an temper device of the mind keeper.^[156]

The true being is not the mind, the Being is the Being, says the Gnostic. If temporarily the disciple has dispossessed himself from his mind, he can talk with the guardian. Then, the mind seems to be an independent individual that sits in front of him. After this deep exploration, the devotee will be aware that his mind is a wild force, which he must overcome, command and direct. Depriving himself from this terrible sentinel allows transform his matter mind into Christ mind.^[156]

To succeed the spiritual practitioner works via the inner fire, asserts Weor. Awaking the igneous serpent of the mental body, it runs the spinal cord (the igneous wings) and then him daringly faces this dark beast and defeats it in an appalling wrestling match. As a consequence, after that moment, the mind of the spiritual practitioner only obeys the direct commands of the true self.^[156]