Glossary: New Media

lag

The amount of time that passes from when users click web links or submit forms to when the requested content or results pages fully load.

landing page

Web page that loads when online shoppers click advertising links. Landing pages are frequently specialized. A sporting goods e-tailer may feature three sport-specific landing pages for customized ads that appear after searches for “baseball,” “tennis,” and “golf.”

latency

The time that it takes data to move from a server to a client. High latency can cause media streams to cut in and out, and drive prospective shoppers to abandon slow loading landing pages.

link

Website text or graphical hotspot coded to direct clicking visitors to a specified online destination. Short for hyperlink.

link baiting

A best practice where websites try to increase their inbound links by publishing compelling content. Rather than post on a link farm or join a “web ring,” a site “baits” other sites to add its link because the other site’s users would find the content worthwhile.

link checking

Ensuring that a website’s outbound links reach their intended destinations. This basic web maintenance task is most efficiently handled with automated link checking software.

link farm

Website whose sole mission is to provide a place for other websites to easily acquire an inbound link. But since many search engine algorithms can identify link farms, the guilt by association factor can actually lower relevancy rankings.

link rot

The state of a website accumulating a number of broken links for its own pages. This occurs when webmasters move files or re-engineer navigation structures, then forget to repoint the links to the corresponding content files’ new locations.

link spam

Practice of adding a website’s URL to as many external pages as possible—with no reciprocal benefit for that site—to artificially boost the inbound link count. A common technique is to post comments on various blogs, forums and message boards, appending a site URL every time.

list fatigue

Condition when email from a particular mailing list wears out its welcome by sending too much duplicate or rote correspondence.

list rental

Practice where advertisers pay a fee to like-minded companies and email list owners to send out marketing messages on its behalf. Such messages’ recipients should be on record as opting-in to accept solicitations from third party vendors.

load testing

Simulating the actions of hundreds or thousands of coincident visitors to gauge a server’s ability to handle an anticipated amount of simultaneous traffic.

log files

Lengthy text files that record computing transactions. In a marketing environment, the critical log file records every hit, every visitor’s location, every file that visitors access, the duration of each session, and so on. Most sites employ log analysis software to parse the raw log files, which contain far too much text to digest without help.

login

Required authentication mechanism to access protected data resources, media content, networks and websites. Most authentication scripts employ a user ID and password scheme.

long tail

A marketing strategy and content provisioning theory that suggests that as consumers lose faith in mainstream mass media, they embrace niche content and vendors that provide it. To maintain a healthy consumer base segmented by increasingly specialized tastes, retailers and e-tailers need to stock extensive inventories to create a mass audience by combining all the small ones.

loop

One complete play cycle for an animation or video. A banner ad may loop a 15 second animation eight times to achieve a two-minute exposure.

lossy compression

Algorithm that removes redundant information from audio, video and image files to reduce their size. The “loss” in sound and picture quality is barely noticeable online, but may be apparent in high-end home entertainment systems and photo printers.