This industry is going down the toilets. Even the biggest will lose out eventually. The "free porn" model is going to take over and even those selling to Web Cams and Dating sites will lose out eventually. Remember no one foresaw the death of paysites, yet today it's on the horizon.
Could porn of aver resisted the move to free? Not without massive Government intervention and laws.
Many Online businesses are nothing like offline businesses. And there lies the route of the problem.
Offline if you want to start a business, you need to invest something, usually a lot. It requires somewhere to trade, equipment, stock and more.
Online for many required nothing but some time and even fr those who did invest something it was little. If I wanted to shoot a girl for magazines, I needed to pay the girls, make up, film, props, clothing, location and then the equipment. Cost was often $800 a day and could rise. Then is had to be good enough to sell in a competitive market.
Today a custom shooter needs some equipments and then gets paid up front. And it's sold.
I only use myself as an example. The same applies to an affiliates, often a site owner and others. The investment is low and if you throw enough traffic at it. Someone will buy. So the people who entered online porn often weren't real businessmen. Little to risk and lots to gain. And pretty low business morals.
AFF years ago would allow affiliate to steal content to promote them and they were just one of many. Today these people have the ability to put out 1,000s of scenes for little cost and just a handful of sales will pay the BW. The sponsors often don't give a shit and often are guilty of it themselves.
How many programs have Tubes with pirated content on them and make excuses for not deleting them?
How many praise these people for having the most traffic, how many sites feed off that traffic? From affiliates submitting to processors processing, who cares?