Best articles about business Violet Blue read in 2014 were about sex work

[seksi]

Violet Blue wrote a nice piece about the censorship and discrimination she faces in running her legal business as a sex blogger, and linked to two solid business articles articles at the end of her testimony. This sounds familiar:

This year officially marks my tenth year as a full-time freelance writer. In 2005, Jonno convinced me to quit Good Vibrations and run Fleshbot with him, while writing books, and I went for it. (As an aside, December 2014 was the ten-tear birthday of Open Source Sex.) Since quitting my day job as a copywriter and retail superheroine, I?ve authored and edited many books, and reported/blogged/wrote feature pieces for a lot of great news outlets, magazines, newspapers and blogs.

But it?s never entirely stable, especially with a publishing industry in constant identity and financial crisis ? and on top of that, my first and continuing challenge is self-regulation. Every freelancer knows what I mean.

Then, there?s the figuring out how to run my business part, which is very very far from any cookie-cutter startup, author, freelance journo or small business template.

I?ll just put it this way: If it wasn?t for sex censorship by so many major companies, financial institutions, tools and platforms, I?d *only* have to face the typical set of challenges all women face who run their own business. The limitations of censorship, plus the danger of doing business with companies who routinely deal unfairly (and occasionally behave harmfully) to independent businesses/businesspeople (whose business might be sex-related), has absolutely hurt me as a businessperson.

That?s everything from having my name blacklisted in search engine autocompletes, to getting accounts revoked without actually breaking any rules, being disallowed to advertise (or take advertising) through everyday channels like AdSense, worrying payment processors and social media sites (and more) will delete my account, unable to plan around Amazon and Google who may de-list (or deep-six) sexuality searches without notice, being unable to do a Kickstarter or put an app about human sexuality in Apple or Google?s marketplaces, constantly being reported on sites I have accounts on simply because some people think what I do is wrong, not being able to use any of the decent mailing list companies to have a newsletter? I could go on.

I just write about sex. That?s it.

You should read the article. Follow the links. And then build more clever internet stuff to defeat the casual censorship and financial bottlenecks that constrict sexual free expression here in Kim Jung Un's North Korea, um, I mean Amazon/Visa's America.

[seksi]

From the story Violet Blue linked to Sex is Sex. But Money is Money

In my first ads, I used very little copy. What was the point? What I know now is that guys want to know the women they?re fucking. It surprised me, but a lot of them ? most of them ? really need to feel a sort of connection. Reading about Angelina?s easy laugh, or how Anna loves luxury travel, made them more comfortable. And when they?re more comfortable, they call. I always wondered why Playboy ran those little interviews with the girls alongside the photos. Now I know. The guys who are jerking off want to feel like they know the girl.

[Bladewire]

Bravo! A lot of quality information there, good read for many

[seksi]

Jiz Lee's article: TRICKS OF THE TRADE: Porn?s ?Best Practices? for Content Trades and Shares is much more germane to our business, but not as easy to read.

I had a great conversation with her at AEExpo last year, and I think she should be invite to organize a panel for performers on affiliate marketing at a show like Internext... Siri was generous with her time and talked a lot about making money as an affiliate in addition to being paid per shoot in an interview with us - Siri would be great on a panel like this, too.

?I don?t share or trade content with people who have much larger methods of distribution than my own ? that would create a really wide gap between our profit margins, which I believe is unfair,? says Siri. ?That?s why even though I?ve been approached for content share/trade by directors before, I?ve never agreed to any content sharing/trading with producers who regularly can afford to hire talent for a scene ? they would profit from the scene exponentially more than I would.?

Siri also warns performers to beware of signs that they could be taken advantage of, and advocates for their autonomy in doing the scenes they want to do. Deals should be equally beneficial to both parties. ?Look out for anyone who seems like they?re trying to convince you that you should share content with them, because if they have to do any convincing they?re probably aware that they?re kind of taking advantage of you, or that they will benefit more from it in some way.? As with paid scenes, performers should be comfortable declining a shoot for any reason. ?You?re working for free, because you hope to profit from the content, so you should be 100% sure that you will love doing the work!?

In my opinion, though, Stoya is useless. Mentioned 3 times, contributing nothing, she gets thanked. Maybe there is still some search traffic for her, I dunno :P

[Bladewire]

Originally Posted by seksi

Jiz Lee's article: TRICKS OF THE TRADE: Porn?s ?Best Practices? for Content Trades and Shares is much more germane to our business, but not as easy to read.

I didn't want to be rude, but yes it was a rough read, but with a refreshing insight and always good to obsorb the experiences & lessons learned by others in our industry

[Arnox]

Originally Posted by seksi

From the story Violet Blue linked to Sex is Sex. But Money is Money

I think this is also what makes My Free Cams so fucking popular. The girls on there aren't always doing sexual things. Some just sit around, talk shit, play guitar, eat food and interact with their audience. People think that the promise of sex is the only want to sell a product: sometimes making a guy feel like he's appreciated, known and interesting is also one route to go down.

Sure, the sex aspect helps, but there are girls on MFC who don't even get naked yet bring in bank every month.