Another mans POV of the porn market.

[Paul Markham]

Seeing some of the comments on this thread http://www.gfy.com/fucking-around-and-business-discussion/1001722-mainstream-webmaster-fix-playboy.html I thought I would weigh in with another view of the porn market a bit wider than some who are more Internet based.

Over the years Eva and I have made a lot of money from the Internet. Selling content to the Internet was a very profitable business up to about 2006. In the early days, before digital cameras were affordable it was a goldmine. Especially if the content you was selling was paid for by another market.

During the 15 years plus of selling on the Internet I've seen many many people with little or no money to spend come and go. A very few made it, a lot didn't. We opened Bargain Basement to cater for those who couldn't afford to spend $40 for a set and sold the already sold or less wanted sets for $5 to $10 and sold them a 100 times or more.

We never shot much custom because of the prices offered. $300 to $400 for a solo girl scene was the going price. Often people couldn't afford that. Their was more money in selling a set to the AVS people 100 times than there was in shooting custom. The big sponsors who could just wouldn't and thought loading a site with low level porn was the way.

And in general my view of the Internet was, easy money to be made by selling content, a lot of small people and a few big.

Now read the second part.

[Paul Markham]

And this view of the Internet was fairly general with other producers and publishers. Shooters were surprised that we were selling sets or/and videos for $40 to $100. What they didn't realise was how many times we were selling them. And that we had already made a profit from them.

Their view of the Internet was that it was 1,000s of sites trying to get buyers by giving away the product that in the main was pretty low quality. And the earnings in general was poor. Which is why so few came into the Internet in a big way. They were also worried the harm it would do on their traditional markets.

Many only came to the Internet when their traditional markets had gone down. Some still don't see the Internet as their main market. And for some that's exactly right.

No Internet based sponsor would or could afford to pay Eva and I enough to get us to work for them full time.

No Internet based sponsor would or could afford to pay to pay for a top producer like Jack Harrison, Bill Wright, Lindsay Honey, Kevin Maklin, Micheal Ancher, Viv Thomas and more. Many more. DVD companies can and do.

No Internet based sponsor could or would spend the money on producing a product to rival Wicked, Vivid, Penthouse, Playboy, Digital Desires and more. Many more.

It's no good saying the money is elsewhere. These companies produce expensive porn on a weekly basis. Because the money is there.

Even today in a market that's in free fall these companies still produce a level the Adult Internet doesn't or can't.

Over the last 5 years I've seen many good to great shooters turn their hand to becoming weddings photographers/videographers, advertising, one shoots wild life in Africa, another shoots hotels around the Med or like me retire. BECAUSE they earn more that the top custom shooters ever do or they made enough money to sit back.

And a few publishers kick their porn business out to concentrate on other things. Like PRO, D. Gold, D Sullivan, R. Desmond, etc. Because there's more money elsewhere.

Like affiliates going into mainstream many others have done the same.

Have to go, Eva's wants me to do the ironing. LOL

[Agent 488]

paul you just don't get it and probably never will. but i will explain.

in culture - which is being accelerated by the internet - there is an increasing demand for amateur or reality based entertainment. think youtube, reality tv, social networking etc.

there is the same trajectory in porn.

people want amateur reality content, and since it is cheap to produce there is no reason to spend money on some glam shot that is less and less popular with time.

once you grasp that things will fall into place.

[signupdamnit]

Originally Posted by Paul Markham

Over the last 5 years I've seen many good to great shooters turn their hand to becoming weddings photographers/videographers, advertising, one shoots wild life in Africa, another shoots hotels around the Med or like me retire. BECAUSE they earn more that the top custom shooters ever do or they made enough money to sit back.

And a few publishers kick their porn business out to concentrate on other things. Like PRO, D. Gold, D Sullivan, R. Desmond, etc. Because there's more money elsewhere.

Like affiliates going into mainstream many others have done the same.

Have to go, Eva's wants me to do the ironing. LOL

It's an interesting post. Thanks for sharing it. I particularly like how it feels a little less preachy than some of your other ones. I agree, people will go where the money is and you're right. I notice a ton of affiliates leaving. Personally I think a lot of it has to do with the various games sponsors are playing at the affiliate's expense to make up for falling revenue although I think falling conversions and a greater difficulty in getting good traffic also has to do with it. Like the content shooters there comes a point where many will say screw it and decide to do something else instead. The same is also happening with bigger companies who are not taking in the amount of revenue (and a few are losing millions as well) they are used to. Even though they are still profitable they are leaving to focus on other things.

[bronco67]

Market over-saturation is going to dilute the quality of the product overall. Most porn is the exactly the same, and shit. I love Jayden James like you would not believe -- but honestly, if you've seen one of her scenes, you've seen them all. Why keep making identical products over and over again?

A high quality, unique product will always have customers.

Just talking from a surfer's perspective -- because while I am here to get insight into the adult business as I try to make my own product -- I'm still a surfer. I want to make my adult graphic novel and animation because I love erotica and porn. I believe too many people are making porn as a job, and not as a passion.

Look at Jules Jordan's work. That guy is an artist, no matter what anyone thinks of him. He puts some fucking stank on his scenes, and it's not the kind of thing someone can learn. For one of every Jules Jordan or John Leslie, there's 1000 hacks "trying to make a buck". People with talent and vision will make the money. The rest of it will go to crooks and clever business people who can work the system to their advantage. But that won't last long term.

[Dodododa]

Don't a lot of sites offer those beautiful DVDs for download??

[Paul Markham]

Originally Posted by Agent 488

paul you just don't get it and probably never will. but i will explain.

in culture - which is being accelerated by the internet - there is an increasing demand for amateur or reality based entertainment. think youtube, reality tv, social networking etc.

there is the same trajectory in porn.

people want amateur reality content, and since it is cheap to produce there is no reason to spend money on some glam shot that is less and less popular with time.

once you grasp that things will fall into place.

Yes amateur is in a lot more demand than top end glamor. But that's not the point.

It's about supply and demand.

There are a handful of producers who can produce top end glamor. There are 1,000s who can produce amateur. So the Amateur market is saturated and SALES PER SCENE OR SITE are poor. And sales on a top end glamor scene are better. Far far better.

That's why Internet only based companies can't afford the top end shooters and DVD companies can. It's not about only the money spent, it's about talent, skill and experience.

[Paul Markham]

Back to work, Eva is back and asking what I'm doing.

[pornguy]

Originally Posted by bronco67

Market over-saturation is going to dilute the quality of the product overall. Most porn is the exactly the same, and shit. I love Jayden James like you would not believe -- but honestly, if you've seen one of her scenes, you've seen them all. Why keep making identical products over and over again?

A high quality, unique product will always have customers.

Just talking from a surfer's perspective -- because while I am here to get insight into the adult business as I try to make my own product -- I'm still a surfer. I want to make my adult graphic novel and animation because I love erotica and porn. I believe too many people are making porn as a job, and not as a passion.

Look at Jules Jordan's work. That guy is an artist, no matter what anyone thinks of him. He puts some fucking stank on his scenes, and it's not the kind of thing someone can learn. For one of every Jules Jordan or John Leslie, there's 1000 hacks "trying to make a buck". People with talent and vision will make the money. The rest of it will go to crooks and clever business people who can work the system to their advantage. But that won't last long term.

Funny someone from a Huge Adult company told me that the surfers would pay far more for a named star than a no body.

I dis agreed and that was the end if it. I was wrong.

Well at least this person thought I was wrong.

[Robbie]

Originally Posted by Paul Markham

That's why Internet only based companies can't afford the top end shooters and DVD companies can. It's not about only the money spent, it's about talent, skill and experience.

It's not a case of "can't afford" in my opinion. Over the last decade as the internet took over and DVD sales have fallen to nothing...PLENTY of internet companies have made hundreds of millions of dollars while DVD companies are going broke.

Also DVD studios are barely shooting anything. They can't afford to.

Finally, remember that any product or service is really only worth what someone will pay for it.

DVD companies were used to shooting one project at a time. 5 or 6 scenes over a couple of months of work.

Internet companies like Naughty America shoot 4 or 5 scenes everyday, 5 days a week. If they paid a guy some crazy amount to shoot that, they would NOT make one penny more.

So whether or not Paul Markham or any other old school "skilled" shooter shoots it...it really doesn't matter.

Not being disrespectful to your ability Paul...I literally have no idea what you can or can't do. I've only seen some pics you've posted of your work and it was okay.

In the end...the GIRL who is fucking is the one who is gonna sell. I don't care if Paul is shooting it or if Fatfoo is shooting it...if the girl is a dead fish, then you have a shitty scene.

Now give both guys a girl who loves sex and "shines" on camera...and you will have a scene that will make my cock hard. Paul may set his up "nicer", but my cock doesn't care about that.

To me...and from all the work that I have done...the GIRL is what sells. She has to have that passion and personality, and of course the body and face that makes people want to fuck her.

And that's where a good videographer/photographer/director/producer DOES make a difference by creating the proper environment for the girl to be able to be unleashed in her raw sexuality.

But do I think that over-paying someone to shoot a scene equals more sales? No. Not at all. As an affiliate I have seen it with my own two eyes.

One minute I'm making 20 grand a month as an affiliate selling porn. Then BangBus came along with a guy using a shitty consumer camcorder fucking amateur bitches in the back of a van while everybody is giggling and talking...and BOOM...I'm making 100 grand a month and "reality" gonzo porn was born.

That just doesn't lie. People were always WANTING to see real sex. But Porn Valley (as always) didn't understand what the rest of the world wanted. So they gave us the dumb scripted and lame porn that I grew up on in the 1970's and pretty much ignored it as a young man in the 1980's.

And pornographers around the world followed their lead because they thought Porn Valley knew best.

Well...10 years ago when that little company in Miami released Bang Bus and later Milf Hunter...it showed just how out of touch that L.A. and porn valley really are with the majority of people's sexual desires in this world.

And today? I bet Ernesto could buy and sell most of Porn Valleys DVD companies...but why would he? They don't sell.

Could he afford you Paul? Yes. He could also pay somebody $20,000 to mow his yard. But why would he? The results are going to be the same in the end. Why overpay for a service?

I know that's not what you want to hear. But as a former content company owner...I saw the writing on the wall back in 2002 and sold mine. It was obvious that porn companies were all going to start shooting their own content.

And quite frankly...that is for the best. I'd rather watch a teen scene that is shot by someone with a genuine love of teen. Or BBW. Or Milf. Or any niche. Much better content than some content provider who may or may not understand that particular niche trying to shoot it.

For instance, when I had my content company...I was real good at shooting teen. But I had to be schooled by my foot fetish and smoking fetish customers on what they wanted to see...and I was surprised at what they wanted because I didn't understand the fetish and never will.

[Hentaikid]

It's not just in porn, the internet is a bottom feeding medium that has never supported anything major, because it can always leech off the "outside" world. No blockbuster movies will be made for the internet, but there's a bit of margin for single producer art like comics, even so it's all very thin in comparison to the "real world", although it's compensated a bit in terms of sheer quantity (i.e. all the guys with cheap digital cameras)

It's dissapointing, but what are you going to do. Back in the pre dot com bust some people did try to make high budget content just for the net, and they ended up going bust

[Agent 488]

Originally Posted by Paul Markham

Yes amateur is in a lot more demand than top end glamor. But that's not the point.

It's about supply and demand.

There are a handful of producers who can produce top end glamor. There are 1,000s who can produce amateur. So the Amateur market is saturated and SALES PER SCENE OR SITE are poor. And sales on a top end glamor scene are better. Far far better.

That's why Internet only based companies can't afford the top end shooters and DVD companies can. It's not about only the money spent, it's about talent, skill and experience.

there are plenty that can paul. there is just not that much of a demand for it.

when are you ever going to get it?

WHAT YOU THINK PEOPLE WANT - THEY DON'T.

IT'S NOT THAT THEY CANNOT AFFORD IT. THEY DON'T WANT TO BUY IT. BECAUSE THEY CAN'T SELL IT.

the kind of shoots and styles you describe is now just a niche in the sea of porn.

[Paul Markham]

Originally Posted by bronco67

Market over-saturation is going to dilute the quality of the product overall. Most porn is the exactly the same, and shit. I love Jayden James like you would not believe -- but honestly, if you've seen one of her scenes, you've seen them all. Why keep making identical products over and over again?

A high quality, unique product will always have customers.

Just talking from a surfer's perspective -- because while I am here to get insight into the adult business as I try to make my own product -- I'm still a surfer. I want to make my adult graphic novel and animation because I love erotica and porn. I believe too many people are making porn as a job, and not as a passion.

Look at Jules Jordan's work. That guy is an artist, no matter what anyone thinks of him. He puts some fucking stank on his scenes, and it's not the kind of thing someone can learn. For one of every Jules Jordan or John Leslie, there's 1000 hacks "trying to make a buck". People with talent and vision will make the money. The rest of it will go to crooks and clever business people who can work the system to their advantage. But that won't last long term.

Think in general of the Adult Internet business model.

Produce a low cost site, nice design, CMS and content in general shot by people who couldn't compete at a level paying far more. Or shot by the site owner himself. And turn them out over and over again. Rinse and repeat.

The result was sites full of the same scene time and time again, often faked, often badly shot in terms of angles and poses and often just a clone of the scene the model and shooter had done an hour before. The only difference was the sofa, bed or girl.

The approach was to throw as much traffic as possible at it and some would convert. So more and more effort and money was put into getting affiliates to send more and more traffic and the cost was often met by the content budget.

Think of the long term effect on buyers of this business model.

Yes a few sites actually stopped to think "We're all playing leap frog with each other for traffic." A few like, Sapphic Erotica, FTV, Alsscan, Naughty America and some others had members areas and tours that converted better and retained longer. And had 100s of serious affiliates sending them traffic. For some these top sites didn't work because they were saturated with affiliates.

[Paul Markham]

Originally Posted by Robbie

It's not a case of "can't afford" in my opinion. Over the last decade as the internet took over and DVD sales have fallen to nothing...PLENTY of internet companies have made hundreds of millions of dollars while DVD companies are going broke.

Also DVD studios are barely shooting anything. They can't afford to.

Finally, remember that any product or service is really only worth what someone will pay for it.

DVD companies were used to shooting one project at a time. 5 or 6 scenes over a couple of months of work.

Internet companies like Naughty America shoot 4 or 5 scenes everyday, 5 days a week. If they paid a guy some crazy amount to shoot that, they would NOT make one penny more.

So whether or not Paul Markham or any other old school "skilled" shooter shoots it...it really doesn't matter.

Not being disrespectful to your ability Paul...I literally have no idea what you can or can't do. I've only seen some pics you've posted of your work and it was okay.

In the end...the GIRL who is fucking is the one who is gonna sell. I don't care if Paul is shooting it or if Fatfoo is shooting it...if the girl is a dead fish, then you have a shitty scene.

Now give both guys a girl who loves sex and "shines" on camera...and you will have a scene that will make my cock hard. Paul may set his up "nicer", but my cock doesn't care about that.

To me...and from all the work that I have done...the GIRL is what sells. She has to have that passion and personality, and of course the body and face that makes people want to fuck her.

And that's where a good videographer/photographer/director/producer DOES make a difference by creating the proper environment for the girl to be able to be unleashed in her raw sexuality.

But do I think that over-paying someone to shoot a scene equals more sales? No. Not at all. As an affiliate I have seen it with my own two eyes.

One minute I'm making 20 grand a month as an affiliate selling porn. Then BangBus came along with a guy using a shitty consumer camcorder fucking amateur bitches in the back of a van while everybody is giggling and talking...and BOOM...I'm making 100 grand a month and "reality" gonzo porn was born.

That just doesn't lie. People were always WANTING to see real sex. But Porn Valley (as always) didn't understand what the rest of the world wanted. So they gave us the dumb scripted and lame porn that I grew up on in the 1970's and pretty much ignored it as a young man in the 1980's.

And pornographers around the world followed their lead because they thought Porn Valley knew best.

Well...10 years ago when that little company in Miami released Bang Bus and later Milf Hunter...it showed just how out of touch that L.A. and porn valley really are with the majority of people's sexual desires in this world.

And today? I bet Ernesto could buy and sell most of Porn Valleys DVD companies...but why would he? They don't sell.

Could he afford you Paul? Yes. He could also pay somebody $20,000 to mow his yard. But why would he? The results are going to be the same in the end. Why overpay for a service?

I know that's not what you want to hear. But as a former content company owner...I saw the writing on the wall back in 2002 and sold mine. It was obvious that porn companies were all going to start shooting their own content.

And quite frankly...that is for the best. I'd rather watch a teen scene that is shot by someone with a genuine love of teen. Or BBW. Or Milf. Or any niche. Much better content than some content provider who may or may not understand that particular niche trying to shoot it.

For instance, when I had my content company...I was real good at shooting teen. But I had to be schooled by my foot fetish and smoking fetish customers on what they wanted to see...and I was surprised at what they wanted because I didn't understand the fetish and never will.

Robbie. Think harder next time.

It's not, as I said, that some couldn't afford. Those who couldn't didn't.

Those who worked for these companies couldn't supply a far better paying market. If they could you have to seriously question their business sense. Yes the Internet largely damaged the rest of the porn business by giving away product. But until 2005 magazines and DVD shooter could earn 10 times (selling non exclusive licenses) what an Internet shooter earned (selling exclusive content).

Content on our stores earned more than custom shooters made, without magazine or DVD sales.

OK the shooters were all bad business men who didn't know about the rest of the porn world. So why didn't the sponsors sell content to magazines and DVD companies? ATK paid $1500 for 5 sets and videos or 10 sets. Why didn't they take 1 of those sets per shoot and sell it to magazines for $1800 US + $1,000 UK? $3,000 return for the cost of posting a disc. They needed to get in with a magazine with a phone call or visit. Once in the rest of the market was open. "Did you see my recent set in Barely Legal? Well I'm phoning you to introduce myself."

Imagine a members area full of content that was paid for by magazines and even made a profit from those sales. Your "Naughty America" example is wrong if you think of it wider.

They could of employed someone to do it if your excuse is "They didn't have the time."

And that was the level of business men I met all the time. People who had no clue the rest of the business existed. People who didn't think. "Paul Markham keeps shooting new content, he won't shoot custom, he keeps talking about magazines, WTF is he doing. That I might be able to do?"

Robbie, think of it as a missed opportunity. One year when you were attending Internext in LV you could of walked along the corridor, gone into the AVN show and sold your CM scenes for $5,000 a piece. Not 2010, but 2000 for sure. If they were worth $5,000 a scene that is to DVD companies. Even $1,000 a scene would of been nice. Then fly to Berlin and go to the Internet and porn show there. Again sell the same scene for $5,000. $10,000 for a single scene. Produce 12 DVDs a year and that's your shoot budget paid for. All free money. ;)

Who cares if my content is good or not? Magazines paying 10 times more than Internet sites.

[Nathan]

Paul, you have not been active in this biz for a long time. You do not even know what people like us spend on exclusive scenes...

Also, the day of pictorials is long gone, you can not compare it to videos. You can ALSO not compare _DVD_ to online content! Its completely different! What works on DVD is VERY VERY hard to sell online efficiently! But it sells offline on a per-DVD basis making $15-$20 to the producer, he will sell 1000-50000 units depending on quality, so spending 200k on a HIGH QUALITY production was not a problem, now its getting harder but its still doable (see Pirates for example).

But the online market works COMPLETELY different. This is EXACTLY the reason why all the dvd companies out there, and I mean ALL of them, _suck_ online. It is VERY VERY different to sell online than it is to sell DVDs.

I do not know a single DVD company that is TRUELY doing a good job online, selling MEMBERSHIPS in high volumes. I know plenty online companies that sell memberships well and use their content to sell DVDs too...

The game has changed... you can not compare it to the pictorial days...

(BTW, would love to hear a guess from you about how much we spend on avg on a girl/boy scene.)

[BVF]

Originally Posted by Paul Markham

No Internet based sponsor would or could afford to pay Eva and I enough to get us to work for them full time.

No Internet based sponsor would or could afford to pay to pay for a top producer like Jack Harrison, Bill Wright, Lindsay Honey, Kevin Maklin, Micheal Ancher, Viv Thomas and more. Many more. DVD companies can and do.

No Internet based sponsor could or would spend the money on producing a product to rival Wicked, Vivid, Penthouse, Playboy, Digital Desires and more. Many more.

No internet based CUSTOMER gives a flying fuck nor do they even know who Paul Markham is

[Robbie]

Originally Posted by Paul Markham

Robbie, think of it as a missed opportunity. One year when you were attending Internext in LV you could of walked along the corridor, gone into the AVN show and sold your CM scenes for $5,000 a piece. Not 2010, but 2000 for sure. If they were worth $5,000 a scene that is to DVD companies. Even $1,000 a scene would of been nice. Then fly to Berlin and go to the Internet and porn show there. Again sell the same scene for $5,000. $10,000 for a single scene. Produce 12 DVDs a year and that's your shoot budget paid for. All free money. ;)

Who cares if my content is good or not? Magazines paying 10 times more than Internet sites.

Yes...theoretically that would have been true in 2000 IF I had a CM scene to sell (started that in 07).

You're kinda glossing over the fact that in 2000 there were a lot less folks with computers and only a tiny fraction with a broadband internet connection. So more people were buying porn DVD's and/or magazines then.

That isn't the case today.

Nobody in their right mind is going to sneak down to an adult bookstore in a small town, pay $50 for a DVD, take a chance that their car will be seen and they will be recognized...Why would they, when from the comfort of their own home they can buy a membership for $29.99 and get hundreds if not thousands of scenes of EXACTLY what they want? Not what some company told them was "hot", but what the customer himself gets off on.

I know that for content shooters like yourself, this isn't the best situation. If you were still hungry to kick it in porn (I assume that you aren't because you've said a few times that you are almost semi-retired from it and did well enough to not have to work anymore), I would say that you would make 1000 times more money by shooting for your own paysite exclusively.

Just shoot the exact stuff that makes YOUR dick get hard because you will then give it all your knowledge, skill, and passion for that particular "niche".

Remember...there are over 6 billion people in this world and about half of us are men. So that's 3 billion plus guys that are potential customers. Only takes a couple of thousand of those guys to make you a lot of money every month.

[DamianJ]

"I used to be with it, but then they changed what "it" was. Now, what I'm with isn't it, and what's "it" seems weird and scary to me."

[Paul Markham]

Another POV.

This statement is scary after all the years of the Internet.

"reality" gonzo porn was born"

Go tell that to John Stagliano and he copied someone else. The first time I saw Gonzo was from a guy shooting in NY, forget his name. But it was in the days of Beta Cam cameras that weighed a ton.



Me in 1995. Shooting amateur Gonzo for DVD.

Also there was a guy in Holland shooting a line of videos called "Excuse Me" and Ben Dover in the UK all shooting Gonzo. Long before the Internet took off.

As for amateur well tell that to HomeGrown or Ed Powers and Astral Blue all shooting for the DVD market.

It's a shame a few more Internet people didn't wander across the corridor at LV Internext and see what was selling on DVD. They would be truly shocked.

Nathan your company grew big by allowing uploaders to upload pirated content to a site that took millions of dollars out of the rest of the industry. The people producing the content on Tubes.

I've not seen any Brazzers content recently, but when I did see it to review the site I was appalled at the quality of the porn. It was dull and plastic. I hope you shoot better now.

As for what sells on the Internet not selling on DVD well that's BS.

As for a DVD company not having a big web presence. Did you ever stop to think THEY STILL DON'T SEE THE INTERNET AS THEIR CORE MARKET. And might even see giving away 100s of their scenes for free might harm them? That's why they sue Tubes.

I will bet you don't pay your shooters what Vivid, Wicked, Evil Angel do. Or what we earned out of shooting pictorials.

And that's a POV from the other side.

[Sid70]

Paul is FTW. No, serious. Epic guy. PM me (c).

[Paul Markham]

Originally Posted by Robbie

Yes...theoretically that would have been true in 2000 IF I had a CM scene to sell (started that in 07).

You're kinda glossing over the fact that in 2000 there were a lot less folks with computers and only a tiny fraction with a broadband internet connection. So more people were buying porn DVD's and/or magazines then.

That isn't the case today.

Nobody in their right mind is going to sneak down to an adult bookstore in a small town, pay $50 for a DVD, take a chance that their car will be seen and they will be recognized...Why would they, when from the comfort of their own home they can buy a membership for $29.99 and get hundreds if not thousands of scenes of EXACTLY what they want? Not what some company told them was "hot", but what the customer himself gets off on.

I know that for content shooters like yourself, this isn't the best situation. If you were still hungry to kick it in porn (I assume that you aren't because you've said a few times that you are almost semi-retired from it and did well enough to not have to work anymore), I would say that you would make 1000 times more money by shooting for your own paysite exclusively.

Just shoot the exact stuff that makes YOUR dick get hard because you will then give it all your knowledge, skill, and passion for that particular "niche".

Remember...there are over 6 billion people in this world and about half of us are men. So that's 3 billion plus guys that are potential customers. Only takes a couple of thousand of those guys to make you a lot of money every month.

OK you couldn't but a lot could in 2000. Have you ever tried to sell DVD of CM? Because to my knowledge big tit girls fucking DOES sell on DVD. Not 2000 prices but nice prices. 1,000s of of copies of a DVD title doing the rounds advertising CMs site, better than free. You get paid for these adverts.

If people don't go to porn stores, how do Vivid survive?

Stop thinking of all the sites that made it. Look at it from another POV. I saw loads of people who didn't. People in Vegas telling me they couldn't afford to pay $300 for exclusive, sites that were up and then gone. There were more failures than success stories.

From my POV going exclusive to shoot for my own site was a big gamble. Could of lost what I had built. Think of the other mans POV is all I'm saying.

[Wizzo]

Originally Posted by Paul Markham

As for what sells on the Internet not selling on DVD well that's BS.

That's not what was said, he said what sells on DVD doesn't sell well on the internet not the other way around.

[Nathan]

Paul, leave the tubes out of a discussion they have no place in.

My company also did not grow big because of tubes, doubt you will ever accept or understand that though.

And of course DVD companies think their core market is DVDs, or they would not be DVD companies. But that does not change the fact that they are losing out big time online. Most DVD companies, including Vivid for example, make far less money offline than we make online. Far less. And this is based on numbers from 4 years ago! I know for a fact that most of the DVD companies out there make less than 1 million a month online.

Most DVD companies out there make far less than 1 million a month in general of course, but that's another point...

Shooters like Vivid, Wicked, Evil Angel and such, for a 2 hour DVD, will pay similar amounts as we do for 2 hours of content, I am very sure of that. We just do not shoot 2 hours of content that is somehow connected. Even our Vampire series was only 1 hour 30 minutes if I am not imstaken.

I honestly do not know how much Vivid or Wicked or such spend right now on a single DVD production. But I would guess that a mid-size production DVD will be anywhere between 20k and 30k for a true feature film. Gonzo obviously a lot cheaper.

I am genuinely interested in this stuff though, so anyone that can shed some light on true financials, I'm all ears!

[Paul Markham]

Originally Posted by Wizzo

That's not what was said, he said what sells on DVD doesn't sell well on the internet not the other way around.

Another POV.

As someone who's been going to porn video shows from the time when it was videos. EVERYTHING sold on video. From the amateur to Playboy. From teens to BDSM. From Blonds to Asians. On video there were countless themes and titles.

Less so for magazines because of the distribution limits. Magazines had to go on a shelf in a liquor store or Newsagents. These people were only interested in high selling titles. If a shop took 10 copies of each every month they expected to sell 10 copies every month. Also and far more important was the advertising. Magazine publishers made millions off selling ad space. Advertisers simply weren't buying space in a magazine that sold 10,000 copies a month unless it was wrapped in a deal with a dozen other magazines.

Companies like Fantasy Publications had dozens of titles and sold adverting packages in all of them. It was owned by Richard Desmond, Google him to see who he is. Most magazines sold 50,000 copies a month. Many like Barely Legal sold 200,000 a month and some like Penthouse and Playboy sold even more. So in the main magazine content was middle of the road to cater for a wide audience. But still there was teens to 60+, amateur to Playboy, Big Tits, Legs and even Girlfriends or Wives.

This thread of my POV ISN'T about where we are today. The Internet and it's policy of giving away content, it was trying to sell, for free has done a lot of damage to the porn industry. People who used to spend now don't. Or do you think the millions on Pornhub or downloading Torrents are only paysite customers?

My POV is the Adult Internet took 5 customers from other sides of porn and turned them into 1-2 customers on the Internet. Or were the 10,000 viewing a gallery on a TGP site every day all buying porn? With only 1,000 clicking through to the site, of which 1 would buy. Numbers are to illustrate the point.

And those 10,000 not buying porn from other avenues before?

Nathan all free porn has a place in this discussion. Tubes just took free porn to a new level of damage.

Educating surfers to not buy porn might work for short while so make money now. It won't work long term and when surfers realise Dating Sites that charge can be replaced for free, penis pills are a con and girls on MFC who don't deliver don't get paid Tubes will suffer. It just takes time, like it took them time to learn there's no need to pay for porn.

[Robbie]

Originally Posted by Paul Markham

OK you couldn't but a lot could in 2000. Have you ever tried to sell DVD of CM? Because to my knowledge big tit girls fucking DOES sell on DVD. Not 2000 prices but nice prices. 1,000s of of copies of a DVD title doing the rounds advertising CMs site, better than free. You get paid for these adverts. .

Yes, we did. And Frank at IVD distributed it. The end result was I netted about 25 grand for the sales it did. And it was immediately pirated all over the place and cost me in lost sales online.

All the time and effort that went into it were just not worth it. Frank told me that in 1999 I would have netted 5 times that. But that pieces just don't sell like that anymore.

And on the "reality gonzo was born" comment I made and you misunderstood....REALITY was the main word there. IF there were plenty of DVD's around trying to do "reality" they did not do it correctly. The Bangbus was the first I ever saw that had a guy with a camcorder he bought at Walmart shooting whores in a raw "un-pretty" way. And the sales blew the roof off of everything.

I know that "gonzo" porn was shot before. I had some of that on VCR that I jerked to in 1980. But it starred guys like Peter North and girls like Christy Canyon. lol
It was far from what BangBus was doing and what became a genre online that sold more paysite memberships and made more money than any DVD ever did.

I'm not arguing that Porn Valley studios didn't rule and make monster money 20, 30, 40 years ago. I know they did. I'm only stating that in today's world...online is king.

As far as DVD sales go...I know that you are aware that it's practically completely dead compared to what it was 20, even 10 years ago. And friends of mine who own brick and mortar adult stores make most of their money off of toys, lubes, lingerie, and gay guys sucking each others cocks in the "video rooms".

You know that. And it doesn't matter how many little 's you put behind a statement...you know that I'm speaking the truth.

My guess would be that Vivid makes more money on VOD online like this: http://theater.aebn.net/dispatcher/f...chType=mov ie
than they do selling DVD's in actual Adult Book Stores.

[Nathan]

I would _LOVE_ to see TRUE revenue of porn in 1990, 2000 (on and offline) compared to today (on and offline)... I bet many people would be surprised...

Paul, you live in the past, you show this all the time... Tube sites make virtually no money with dating and H&B ads today... its silly that you keep saying a way to kill tubes is to show surfers pills do not work and dating sites are fake...

[Klen]

Jesus Christ,cant you people make a post in five lines

[Robbie]

Originally Posted by KlenTelaris

Jesus Christ,cant you people make a post in five lines

Not if you actually have a well thought out post with lots of info in it. But don't worry...there are plenty of folks on here who come through a thread, make a one sentence post that contributes nothing to the conversation...just like you did!

[Paul Markham]

Originally Posted by Nathan

And of course DVD companies think their core market is DVDs, or they would not be DVD companies. But that does not change the fact that they are losing out big time online. Most DVD companies, including Vivid for example, make far less money offline than we make online. Far less. And this is based on numbers from 4 years ago! I know for a fact that most of the DVD companies out there make less than 1 million a month online.

Most DVD companies out there make far less than 1 million a month in general of course, but that's another point...

And most Adult Internet based companies make less than 1 million a month. Some used to, but not many. Remember the price Adult.com was sold to Playboy for? Not the price of a company making or even turning over a million a month.

Shooters like Vivid, Wicked, Evil Angel and such, for a 2 hour DVD, will pay similar amounts as we do for 2 hours of content, I am very sure of that. We just do not shoot 2 hours of content that is somehow connected. Even our Vampire series was only 1 hour 30 minutes if I am not imstaken.

I know what there contnet is like. I don't know what your new content is like. Spending money doesn't give you great porn. It takes more.

So email me a 2 day pass to Brazzers and let me see what your content is like. I will write you a critique of the content. Stating why I think what I do about it in a constructive way. Good or/and bad. I will point out ways to improve, what's good and what's not and why.

I honestly do not know how much Vivid or Wicked or such spend right now on a single DVD production. But I would guess that a mid-size production DVD will be anywhere between 20k and 30k for a true feature film. Gonzo obviously a lot cheaper.

And I don't know either. I do know recently Private were paying 5000 Euros a scene. This was a big drop from the 25,000 GBP they used to spend. I don't see any porn company hiring a chateau for a week to shoot in.

I am genuinely interested in this stuff though, so anyone that can shed some light on true financials, I'm all ears!

I'm genuinely interested in seeing what Brazzers content is like now.

[Paul Markham]

Originally Posted by Nathan

I would _LOVE_ to see TRUE revenue of porn in 1990, 2000 (on and offline) compared to today (on and offline)... I bet many people would be surprised...

Paul, you live in the past, you show this all the time... Tube sites make virtually no money with dating and H&B ads today... its silly that you keep saying a way to kill tubes is to show surfers pills do not work and dating sites are fake...

There are no firm figures to be found, some porn companies were large companies and there finances were public domain.

My impression comes from going into people offices and homes. The Flynt building on Wilshire, Score's offices in Miami, Swank's in New Jersey, Bookpress in Holland and the offices of some UK companies. Also the offices of Scala in Holland and Silwa in Germany.

Paul Raymond made enough out of porn to become a billionaire buying up property in central London on the profits of porn. David Sullivan and David Gold buy Football teams and both very wealthy. David Sullivan bought and refurbished the biggest and most expensive private house project in the UK since WW2 on the proceeds of porn. Richard Desmond got where he is today on the profits of porn.

Never met anyone working on the Adult Internet who could match their earnings.

As for living in the past. Yes I would love to turn the clock back to 2005 and stop it there. Just like 90% of other people working on the Adult Internet I live in the past.

[Klen]

Originally Posted by Robbie

Not if you actually have a well thought out post with lots of info in it. But don't worry...there are plenty of folks on here who come through a thread, make a one sentence post that contributes nothing to the conversation...just like you did!

I can write more then one sentence,but here are posts written like entire articles,which is kind a too much to read.So provide cliffnotes then

[SCORE Ralph]

Originally Posted by DamianJ

"I used to be with it, but then they changed what "it" was. Now, what I'm with isn't it, and what's "it" seems weird and scary to me."

Shuddap grandpa

[fuzebox]

Originally Posted by Paul Markham

And I don't know either. I do know recently Private were paying 5000 Euros a scene. This was a big drop from the 25,000 GBP they used to spend. I don't see any porn company hiring a chateau for a week to shoot in.

You mean the company that has been hemorraging money for years, keeps firing their executives, and keeps posting huge losses?

[Jim_Gunn]

Originally Posted by Nathan

I am genuinely interested in this stuff though, so anyone that can shed some light on true financials, I'm all ears!

Back in the 1990s and early 2000's when I was shooting adult feature movies on Beta SP for broadcast & VHS/DVD distribution, I would set up these big encampments every other month around NY & NJ and sometimes down in FL with a whole crew and 10-20 performers and produce two (2) five or six scene movies on location at mansions, boats, nudist camps, strip clubs and other neat locations in the space of three looong days. The combined budgets for both movies ranged from $24,000-$32,000 depending on who the star was and whether it was two boy-girl features (soft/hard) or two lesbian dildo extravaganzas with large casts and orgy scenes like my " Strap-On Sally' movies. The last two feature DVD movies I shot as recently as 2009 cost about $25,000 for both, so that hasn't changed much.

On alternate months I used to also take a three-day long weekend out of the office to travel all over the eastern U.S. and Canada recruiting strippers for my 4-5 scene "pro-am" series like "East Coast Sluts" and "Canadian Beaver Hunt" that were shot with no crew at all on Hi-8mm one scene at a time in motels and rented apartments for budgets around $5,000-$7,500. I really paid my dues on those trips and those were some of the most interesting experiences of my life.

Things sure have changed a lot since then in terms of technology with high definition video and in terms of current production styles as well. Mostly it's about internet content of course and DVD is an afterthought for many companies. The real trick no matter which end of the business that you came up in is to produce quality content that will sell in every medium. In 2011 you will have to love porn and respect the end customer to really succeed as a producer,a studio or a program.

I shoot a lot more often and in a completely diffferent style nowadays than I ever did back in the old days. Being in the production trenches for so long and also having been the in-house producer as well as Director of Operations for one of the bigest adult studios in the 90's and seeing all the numbers of units that we manufactured and shipped certainly gives me a lot of perspective on both the production and marketing end of the biz then and now.

[Paul Markham]

This thread is very confusing.

On one hand I have people telling me DVD content doesn't sell on the Internet or the other way around. When in truth the style of DVD or video before DVD was used are as wide as what's on the Adult Internet. And today sites buy DVD content to put on their sites.

Then people are telling us that the DVD industry and magazine industry is in steep decline. So the buyers of the very diverse DVD and magazine market came to the Internet. Because Playboy wasn't their thing and Amateur was? But then why did Amateur DVDs sell so poorly?

Then someone's telling me it's all about "amateur or reality based entertainment". Well amateur and reality wasn't "born" on the Internet. It was born when cameras went from film to video. Fucking a girl in a van wasn't born on the Internet either. It was done long before the Internet.

But on the other hand Nathan is telling us he spends as much as Vivid on a scene. To produce "amateur or reality based entertainment"? Or better quality which doesn't sell on the Internet?

Then Robbie tells us he produced 1 DVD of 5-6 scenes and it being uploaded to Torrents cost him more in online joins than the $25,000 he made from it. But it was only 5-6 scenes. Is that all it takes to satisfy a porn consumers desire of CM. So doesn't his site retain or didn't retain before it got locked down. And how do his members feel about buying so much content when 5-6 scenes are enough?

Then Nathan tells us his Tube sites make very little money. Maybe he's telling the truth. Maybe people who go to Tube sites stop spending like they used to. Maybe traffic to Brazzers from his Tubes suck.

Everyone else tells us Tubes are decimating the industry. Have Tubes turned 1,000s of buyers into free surfers? Or is Nathan lying?

[Robbie]

Originally Posted by Paul Markham

Or is Nathan lying?

That's a rhetorical question right?

Paul, do yourself a favor and put Nathan on ignore.

[Nathan]

Originally Posted by Jim_Gunn

Back in the 1990s and early 2000's when I was shooting adult feature movies on Beta SP for broadcast & VHS/DVD distribution, I would set up these big encampments every other month around NY & NJ and sometimes down in FL with a whole crew and 10-20 performers and produce two (2) five or six scene movies on location at mansions, boats, nudist camps, strip clubs and other neat locations in the space of three looong days. The combined budgets for both movies ranged from $24,000-$32,000 depending on who the star was and whether it was two boy-girl features (soft/hard) or two lesbian dildo extravaganzas with large casts and orgy scenes like my " Strap-On Sally' movies. The last two feature DVD movies I shot as recently as 2009 cost about $25,000 for both, so that hasn't changed much.

On alternate months I used to also take a three-day long weekend out of the office to travel all over the eastern U.S. and Canada recruiting strippers for my 4-5 scene "pro-am" series like "East Coast Sluts" and "Canadian Beaver Hunt" that were shot with no crew at all on Hi-8mm one scene at a time in motels and rented apartments for budgets around $5,000-$7,500. I really paid my dues on those trips and those were some of the most interesting experiences of my life.

Things sure have changed a lot since then in terms of technology with high definition video and in terms of current production styles as well. Mostly it's about internet content of course and DVD is an afterthought for many companies. The real trick no matter which end of the business that you came up in is to produce quality content that will sell in every medium. In 2011 you will have to love porn and respect the end customer to really succeed as a producer,a studio or a program.

I shoot a lot more often and in a completely diffferent style nowadays than I ever did back in the old days. Being in the production trenches for so long and also having been the in-house producer as well as Director of Operations for one of the bigest adult studios in the 90's and seeing all the numbers of units that we manufactured and shipped certainly gives me a lot of perspective on both the production and marketing end of the biz then and now.

Thank you very much for this info! Very interesting. Lower than I expected, but I guess again it depends on the label.

How often did a DVD of that caliber sell on the marked in 2005 or so?

[Nathan]

Originally Posted by Paul Markham

This thread is very confusing.

On one hand I have people telling me DVD content doesn't sell on the Internet or the other way around. When in truth the style of DVD or video before DVD was used are as wide as what's on the Adult Internet. And today sites buy DVD content to put on their sites.

Then people are telling us that the DVD industry and magazine industry is in steep decline. So the buyers of the very diverse DVD and magazine market came to the Internet. Because Playboy wasn't their thing and Amateur was? But then why did Amateur DVDs sell so poorly?

Then someone's telling me it's all about "amateur or reality based entertainment". Well amateur and reality wasn't "born" on the Internet. It was born when cameras went from film to video. Fucking a girl in a van wasn't born on the Internet either. It was done long before the Internet.

But on the other hand Nathan is telling us he spends as much as Vivid on a scene. To produce "amateur or reality based entertainment"? Or better quality which doesn't sell on the Internet?

Then Robbie tells us he produced 1 DVD of 5-6 scenes and it being uploaded to Torrents cost him more in online joins than the $25,000 he made from it. But it was only 5-6 scenes. Is that all it takes to satisfy a porn consumers desire of CM. So doesn't his site retain or didn't retain before it got locked down. And how do his members feel about buying so much content when 5-6 scenes are enough?

Then Nathan tells us his Tube sites make very little money. Maybe he's telling the truth. Maybe people who go to Tube sites stop spending like they used to. Maybe traffic to Brazzers from his Tubes suck.

Everyone else tells us Tubes are decimating the industry. Have Tubes turned 1,000s of buyers into free surfers? Or is Nathan lying?

Paul,

I will tell you my POV...

Original DVD content does not sell on the internet. (Not the other way around! noone ever said that!) This has very little to do with the content being amateur or not. This has to do with how content is shot for DVD, how long it usually is, and how many options you have selling it online. This is not a GENERAL thing, but usually is the case. GONZO DVDs produced for DVD first, might just as well sell relatively easily online, if they know how, but then most do not know how.

Full feature DVDs is mainly what I mean btw... should likely have detailed that

The reason the magazine market is in a decline is obvious, people want videos. The reason why DVDs are in a decline is also obvious, people want to buy the stuff from the comfort of their home. I know quite a few online DVD stores that are still working quite well btw... since they found a mix of the two.

I disagree, as you I think, with the amateur/reality aspect. This is not everything... its one niche, and thats all it is. It might be a big one, but thats it... What exactly Amateur is btw, is very debatable in my opinion. For me amateur is what home grown does... not bang bus, or similar sites. That simply is reality with hookers. (Although also that is a well working niche! And it is not called reality since its real, obviously.. its called reality because it could be perceived as real, in contrast to some pornstar full feature like Pirates.)

Regarding your comment about me saying we spend as much as vivid (per scene, we spend much more than vivid in total), again you are mixing up two posts. I did not say amateur is the only thing that sells. We spend as much as (if not more than) vivid on for example Brazzers content. (And yes, I will get you a login, always like other people's opinion, send me an eMail again to make sure I have your email address to send it to.) Which we can sell very well online since we know how to, but its not a 2 hour full feature film, its 40 minute scenes, longer and they become useless online (cost/value wise). We DO however sell those scenes on DVD collections also. And that quite well. We also sell it on TV.

Your comment to Robbie, I agree with.. I doubt its true. If he is REALLY good at what he does, he will be making 50 joins a day with that site, and I actually doubt that... So in order to lose that much money just because of releasing one DVD, he would need to have lost 1000 joins from it, which is never going to happen... I actually doubt he made 25k on the DVD either though...

I also never said that our Tubes make little money.. I said they did not make the company big (ie are not a major part, they are around 20%), and I said they do not make a lot of money through H&B and Dating! Do not twist my words ;)

Regarding your last comment... of course everyone thinks the tube destroyed it all, its the only way they can think... There are THOUSANDS AND THOUSANDS of people that join paysites every single day. Millions a month. Considering the tube sites make people nolonger buy porn.. maybe you should look at the size of tube sites again... If they would hurt so much, we would not have had a single join in the last 12 months...

That's my opinion... to each their own of course...

[DamianJ]

Originally Posted by Paul Markham

This thread is very confusing.

Let me break it down for you grampa.

You said some things that are comically wrong.

Other people tried nicely to explain why you are wrong.

You got confused.

HTH

Your pal

Damian

[CaptainHowdy]

Originally Posted by KlenTelaris

Jesus Christ,cant you people make a post in five lines

Or with a funny cat image...

[Paul Markham]

Originally Posted by Nathan

Paul,

I will tell you my POV...

Original DVD content does not sell on the internet. (Not the other way around! noone ever said that!) This has very little to do with the content being amateur or not. This has to do with how content is shot for DVD, how long it usually is, and how many options you have selling it online. This is not a GENERAL thing, but usually is the case. GONZO DVDs produced for DVD first, might just as well sell relatively easily online, if they know how, but then most do not know how.

Full feature DVDs is mainly what I mean btw... should likely have detailed that

OK So let's say the Vivid, Wicked end of the market didn't sell well on the Internet, because they didn't know how to market it on the Internet. Why didn't one of the Gurus who knew so much about Internet marketing go to them and make a deal?

Missed opportunity there. Splitting a feature into scenes works.

The reason the magazine market is in a decline is obvious, people want videos. The reason why DVDs are in a decline is also obvious, people want to buy the stuff from the comfort of their home. I know quite a few online DVD stores that are still working quite well btw... since they found a mix of the two.

The reason magazines declined was because there were millions of images being given away for free on the Internet. Comfort of a home buy is a great incentive. If you don't make it easier to get it for free than it is to pay. Free is more comfortable than paid these days.

Regarding your comment about me saying we spend as much as vivid (per scene, we spend much more than vivid in total), again you are mixing up two posts. I did not say amateur is the only thing that sells. We spend as much as (if not more than) vivid on for example Brazzers content. (And yes, I will get you a login, always like other people's opinion, send me an eMail again to make sure I have your email address to send it to.) Which we can sell very well online since we know how to, but its not a 2 hour full feature film, its 40 minute scenes, longer and they become useless online (cost/value wise). We DO however sell those scenes on DVD collections also. And that quite well. We also sell it on TV.

Good maximising the value of content is something most sites totally missed. Some didn't understand they could of paid for their members area with sales offline.

Your comment to Robbie, I agree with.. I doubt its true. If he is REALLY good at what he does, he will be making 50 joins a day with that site, and I actually doubt that... So in order to lose that much money just because of releasing one DVD, he would need to have lost 1000 joins from it, which is never going to happen... I actually doubt he made 25k on the DVD either though...

Robbie has no clue how many joins he lost and was just spouting. Looking at the samples on his site he might of made $25,000 on a single DVD sold world wide. If he had a clue about how that market worked the distributor would of told him the sales would soon double as shops realised it was a good seller.

Regarding your last comment... of course everyone thinks the tube destroyed it all, its the only way they can think... There are THOUSANDS AND THOUSANDS of people that join paysites every single day. Millions a month. Considering the tube sites make people nolonger buy porn.. maybe you should look at the size of tube sites again... If they would hurt so much, we would not have had a single join in the last 12 months...

Giving away the product an industry produces is bad long term business. IMO it works well while buyers from the old style come over and continue to buy. But slowly the buyer learns it's foolish to buy porn when so much is available for free. A few got rich in the boom years. They didn't last long.

The model of building sites on a low quality product then spending a fortune on sending traffic that increasing got harder to sell to, in that ratios over the years got worse and worse and only supported by more and more traffic coming onto the Internet. Because more and more people got dis-satisfied with buying. Average ratios went from around 1-250 to 1-2500 and the only thing that covered this drop was the actual number of surfers on the Adult net increased 10 fold or more. Now that traffic has leveled off and a lot of new traffic simply isn't buying, cultural or economic, the hurt is being felt. The traditional loyal buyer has been put off.

That's my opinion... as well....... to each their own of course...

[Nathan]

Paul,

Regarding your wicked/vivid opportunity lost comment, I agree.. A lot actually...

Regarding the loyal buyers.. They moved, and they are still buying. Thousands and thousands of them every day.

[Robbie]

Originally Posted by Paul Markham

Robbie has no clue how many joins he lost and was just spouting. Looking at the samples on his site he might of made $25,000 on a single DVD sold world wide. If he had a clue about how that market worked the distributor would of told him the sales would soon double as shops realised it was a good seller.

Knowing how many sales I lose or gain is my business Paul. I don't have to prove anything to you...but I KNOW how sales work. I've made a lot of money doing this for a while now.

As far as the distributor telling me that sales "would soon double"...uh, IVD is the biggest distributor in the world. When the owner of it tells me how that business is doing I think I'm going to trust his knowledge of sales and distribution over yours. No offense. But you just made a disparaging remark about my field of expertise (sales) and IVD's field of expertise (distribution) while having no expertise in either field. Just sayin'...

Anyway, I'm not gonna argue points with you. The real reason I came into this thread was to just say that I respect what you do. I don't agree with your ideas on marketing or how to make money. That's all. Have a good day.

[Paul Markham]

Originally Posted by Nathan

Paul,

Regarding your wicked/vivid opportunity lost comment, I agree.. A lot actually...

Regarding the loyal buyers.. They moved, and they are still buying. Thousands and thousands of them every day.

The magazine buyers didn't just move, they mostly stopped buying. The comfort of viewing millions of free images was too much for magazine buyers. TGPs were for them the Tubes of today.

As for DVD buyers all I know was the devastating effect the Internet had on that side of the business. Up until recently the only way to get full scenes was Torrents or buy. Today with Tubes I suspect the same that happened to magazines is happening to paysites. The buyers are more comfortable viewing free scenes than buying a membership.

Because not only is there the problem and risks of using a credit card and Tubes have a lot more to offer. The ability to log in when it please the viewer, not on a paid subscription limit membership. If the viewer only wants 30 minutes once a week a Tube is far better.

Then, and IMO the most important, if the scene doesn't meet the viewers needs, he switches to another scene, and another, and another until he finds what does meet his needs. Many paysites repeat the same scene, view and style. If one scene isn't good enough the next might not be either or the rest. Tubes have a vast selection of different styles, views and ways to shoot the same niche.

Quantity and updates. No need to explain that.

The only downside is the quality of the Tube video. Can't compress the buggery out of it and expect it to be crisp. But stats prove this has meant little to many ex buyers.

[Agent 488]

and in the end it all comes down to paul's usual solution to save the porn industry:

100 videos for $1,000......100 videos for $1,000......19 HD videos for $150......19 HD videos for $150......More Special Offers

ICQ 213327873 or Skype paulmarkham1

[Paul Markham]

IMO. The policy of loading sites with cheap content, what ever the niche, and spending a fortune on free content has led us to where we are today.

Besides bad billing practices, there were other bad practices. Hiding the CANCEL button, locking people into a 30 day recurring membership in a site full of low level porn and then loading the Internet with increasing more free content led to buyers getting harder to convince. The impulse to buy was replaced by the impulse of "Is my CC safe to use?" or "Is this a site with a great tour and little else?" and "Why do I need to buy a months membership when I only want 30 minutes?"

The "Amateur sells" is also wrong. Tell that to Sapphic, Allscan, Twistys, OTCash, FTV, all great sites with great content. And there's more. The reason most went down the amateur line was they simply couldn't afford to pay a good shooter to produce, thought they could shoot it themselves or thought "If I throw enough traffic at it I can sell anything."

The last attitude led to so many sites with the same kind of content it's pointless to protect it. If they do there are 20 other sites who don't with the same content. Different sofa and girl. ;)

Bang Bus did spend money on shooting. They were not scrimping. Some of those who copied them were though.

Many of the old school did come to the Internet, some made it and some didn't. Hustler, Score, PRO, DD Francesco, Gold and Sullivan, Eva and I, Viv Thomas, Swank, Bookpress (Seventeen) and I'm sure there's more. Some employed the Internet Gurus.

We didn't open a paysite, until 2005, because as stated I know little about Internet marketing and I never met anyone who I trusted or had figures to show we would make money. Most of the time it was "Give me all your content and I will do it all for you and give you half the profits." When I did this the returns were crap.

Giving up shooting magazines and selling the same content on the stores to concentrate on a paysite was never an option. Too much of a gamble. Hindsight I'm glad we didn't.

[Paul Markham]

Originally Posted by Agent 488

and in the end it all comes down to paul's usual solution to save the porn industry:

100 videos for $1,000......100 videos for $1,000......19 HD videos for $150......19 HD videos for $150......More Special Offers

ICQ 213327873 or Skype paulmarkham1

Yes for us it works. Selling content today we shot years ago. After the servers are paid all profit.

Did you think, that's the state of most of those buying content today. There's more money in Bargain Basement prices than quality? No of course not.

My solution is to stop selling what can be found for free, start producing content of value and lock it down and stop paying exorbitant amount to get traffic that doesn't buy.

Convert and retain more of what you have.

[DamianJ]

Originally Posted by Paul Markham

Yes for us it works. Selling content today we shot years ago. After the servers are paid all profit.

Did you think, that's the state of most of those buying content today. There's more money in Bargain Basement prices than quality? No of course not.

My solution is to stop selling what can be found for free, start producing content of value and lock it down and stop paying exorbitant amount to get traffic that doesn't buy.

Convert and retain more of what you have.

/=retirement

[Nathan]

paul,

what you just do not accept, understand or simply ignore is that:
1) There are a lot of paysites out there, a lot more than 5 years ago, and a lot of them are GROWING and not SHRINKING! I should know, I own a few of them ;) I also looked at a TON of stats...
2) Many paysites _CAN_ afford paying good shooters. As do we, bangbros, naughty america and others...
3) I agree that many sites out there suck, that many of them do not produce good content, that they are hurt by free content available... but that's not the free content's fault, its the site owner's fault for thinking he can make money with crap... but I think we actually agree there...

The Net is a lovely tool to make money on, and the people that do it right, make a lot of it... there just are VERY VERY few of them that do!

[Cherry7]

I would say a lot of the changes happening in this market reflect wider changes happening in mainstream culture and technology. As porm moved from film to video, so mainstream TV moved from film to video, from programe budgets of 100,000 per hour to 5,000 per hour as the number of channels fragmented the audience and the Ad revenue.

The move from Film to video was also a move from the professional to the amateur.

As a product has less production value in it becomes cheaper and cheaper, and the dominant players can flood the market with product.

I would say it is a mistake to say there is one answer, one busines model, but more likely several models. Profits will continue to be made selling DVD magazines tubes and subscription sites. There is not one buyer but millions of different buyers from all the different cultures of the world. Some want burgers some want to eat french quisine.

One is truck driver wanting to watch big breasted double anal, another is a teen watching has Ipod and yet another a couple wanting to watch something to get them in the mood on their new massive TV without the wife calling him a pervert.

The real element we are selling sexual intimicy and magic and I think this is very difficult to capture. We we are interested in is capturing it as well as we can both from the sex / erotic aspect and the artistic technical side.

An interesting factor is that the technology that de skilled porn and media production is now moving in the other direction. Digital Movie cameras are becoming higher quality than film cameras, TV and projectors are becoming better and better, the technical demands on focus, exposure, white balance, sound are returning. In a few years a lot of content will be unwatchable (it is now ). Where will the full HD high quality stereo sound erotic content come from?

But the main thing is what do people find erotic / hot, and I would say more thought on what and how we shoot would produce better results.