content farm

American  

[kon-tent fahrm] / ˈkɒn tɛnt ˌfɑrm /

noun

Digital Technology.

1. a website that seeks to elevate the ranking of its pages in search results and to attract advertisers by incorporating popular search terms in its high-volume content, often with little attention to originality, appropriateness, or quality of content.

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Other Word Forms

• content farming noun

Etymology

Origin of content farm

First recorded in 2010–15; content ¹ (in the sense “the creative material on the page”) + farm (in the sense ”establishment that produces specific products or services”)

Example Sentences

Galleries are also closing and downsizing, and films that don’t oblige the content farm aren’t solicited as readily as influencer-helmed or easily digestible projects that can be played as background noise for scrolling.

From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 4, 2026

Graphika traced the accounts back to a Bangladeshi content farm that created them in bulk and probably sold them to a third party.

From Seattle Times • Jul. 25, 2021

Surprisingly, what seemed to convert readers most reliably were random stories on the digital content farm that had sprung up around its high-gloss publications.

From The Verge • Mar. 24, 2021

Bradshaw said that content farm websites solely pushing blatantly false stories are being joined by a new breed that blend fabricated stories with more accurate ones.

From New York Times • Aug. 7, 2020

LAP Lambert, I learned, is the print equivalent of a content farm: a clearinghouse for texts that generate tiny amounts of revenue simply by turning up in search and appearing to be legitimate, published works.

From Slate • Mar. 24, 2014