Forum Moderators: not2easy
ssqp said: There are lots of websites in China. But the articles of the websites are copied by the other websites. How about American websites? Is they the same as Chinese websites?
Thank you.
Eliz.
If you mean "most", in terms of simply quantity of domain names/web sites, that may be true here in the U.S. as well.
If you mean "most", in terms of "most popular", "where most people go", "total number of page views", then, no. Most sites that most people visit have original content.
Now, why am I hedging about this?
We have a large number of web sites of various types that have non-original content. There are various schemes for making a small amount of money each on a large number of websites.
These include "type-in domains" which are typically "parked" with pages full of ads, (where the domain name consists of "keywords" that the owner think people may likely type-in to their browser, hoping to find a relevant website there), "scraper sites" (those that illegally copy content from other sites), "MFA" sites ("made for ads") which may consist of "directories" of web sites and "articles" (which are often "scraped") etc. There are also sites that trade "submitted articles".
"Syndicated newsfeeds" are also popular. This is where a site that has original news content makes their content available to other sites, as long as they are credited. There are many sites that have nothing but syndicated content, or use it as an adjunct to their own original content.
Many of these sites are of dubious legality. Others are completely legal but of dubious benefit to anyone.
In my estimation, if you add-up the quantity of all of these types of low-profit websites, there are way more of these than there are "real" websites with their own original content.
But is it where web users spend their time? Not at all. Web users know that these sites are low-quality and generally avoid them if they can. But of course sometimes they get fooled. I think they are in an ever-descending spiral of lower and lower profitability.
The cost of registering and running a web site in the U.S. is extremally low, especially if you do it in quantity. It's entirely feasible to operate a website for $15-20/year. Some people would be overjoyed if they took in, say, $25/year, or a 25% profit. Multiply that by thousands of low-quality websites, and you can make a very nice living... It's practical to do, because much of the process can be automated.
It's very frustrating for those wanting to start a legitimate site with original content. Think up a good domain name, and you will find it is already registered. Satisfy your curiosity, go look at the site, and what do you find? MOST of the time it will be a parked page containing ads.
Often, I joke that it is time to "F-Disk" the Internet and start all over...
