I quit my office job(8 years) sometime around Christmas of 06, and I haven't looked back since. My animation business has been doing so well in that time, I sometimes wish for the work to stop coming in so I can have a break.

there's no way I can go back to 9 to 5 bullshit, dealing with office politics and dumb ass bosses. I always thought that if I'm going to work for an asshole, it might as well be me.

I've been self employed since I was 17 running sites. Put myself through college and pay all my bills from porn. I'm spoiled

over the GW bridge area or 20 minutes into NJ is okay with me since I am only 10 minutes away from the bridge now, but I am not into those wooded type areas. It's still expensive over there and has high taxes...since its so close to NYC. My wife has me taking her food shopping in Edgewater once a month at Mitsuwa Marketplace. Little Falls, NJ is nice also.

Haven't punched the mans clock since 02'... :thumbsup

I am self employeed for over 10 years, last "JOB" i worked was back in october 1999.

There are a lot of things you can do wrong (and right) being self employeed mainly when it comes to taxes and protecting yourself and your income. If you are in the US I can give you some advice. Hit me up if you interested.

The last 'man' I worked for was my dad when I was about 19.

lol funny... but true.

prepare, prepare, and plan....

I can relate to what you are saying above. Since the net is 24/7 you can make money all t he time. Who wants to sleep when you could be making more money. But just as important as it is to make money is to make sure you don't blow it or lose it. As you make money make sure what you are making is put to good use. Set yourself up with a retirement plan, get yourself insured for health, life and disability insurance. If you get sick or hurt and you didn't do any propery planning your ability to make money will not only cease but you will blow through everything you have made and saved.

Sometimes making the money is the easiest part. It is everything else you need to do to make sure you don't fuck up something to lose it that is even harder.

Most self employed people are entrepreneurs and could never work directly for a boss.

That being said... We all work for somebody

I quit my day job new years eve 2003... The first few years were a struggle though, didn't start doing really well until about 2 years ago.

Thanks Will, thats good, solid advice. I am reinvesting into my concepts right now. After my other 2 concepts are up this spring, I am going to to transfer my savings into long term endeavors to do that.

While in law school I actually dated the grand-daughter of one of the pioneers of this industry... Milton Luros... you and no one else has ever heard of him but he was basically the founder of the porn industry in the San Fernando Valley...

He predates Hefner, Flynt and everyone else now alive. He was friends with Rueben Sturman and Sam Roth...

At one time he was considered the wealthiest man in porn by Time Magazine...

Talking with him really started me down the path towards this industry... He was a fascinating and interesting man. And thanks to him, we have an industry. He has three Supreme Court cases in his name and he was directly responsible for bringing the Karma Sutra to the US...

http://cases.justia.com/us-court-of-...89/200/426227/

Dave, when you started, were you just reinvesting everything back into cyberage, or hiring employees based on projected income. The internet was a much different place then, but I bet those first days were like christmas for you every day.

Best advice I have learned over 10+ years.... Don't wait, start now.

If you want to be successful long term first thing you need to do is put the pieces in place to protect your income. Second thing you need to do is set up long term retirement as a safety net. Based on your age, how much you can afford a month and how much you want to retire on at age 65 will determine how much you need to allocate from your revenue each month towards that.

ALL OF US, want to reinvest into our business, start new ventures, etc.. but there is no guarantee that the money will always be there or the new ventures wont flop (most will). If all else fails you always have your retirment plan to fall back on... those that don't have a retirement plan may be depending on family members, social security (if it is even still around) or worst, working till the day they die.

I have seen so many people do really well for themselves for 3-5 years and then they end up going back to working for someone else and making a lot less money. Everything they made they either blew or lost it all. They had no plan, and as fast as the money came in it was gone they may be spending the rest of their lives working for someone else.

1. protect your income.
2. set up a retirement plan as a "worst case scenerio" so if all else fails you can still retire when you get old vs working at walmart till you die.
3. invest what you have left over into your business and new SAFE ventures.

self employed since 2002

self employed since 92...
(1992, not 1892)

I have 2 LLC corporations.

One adult (first first)
One offline (my second)

Both are very successful and growing all the time. It does take alot of hardwork and good decision making. So worth it though. There is literally NOTHING like working for yourself. Especially online and in adult. TAke your laptop to the beach and work if you want too. Where else can you do that? We are lucky bastards haha.

Im 25

Been self employed since January of 1997

Been working for myself most of my life. But, I'll take a side job in a second to help support the dream. Why? Whachoo want? Whatchoo need? All the great shooters work for others as well as themselves. Last I checked money all stacks up the same in the bank. I asked my client: "I thought you were the boss?" He said: "No matter how high you climb, you're always someone's bitch"

Since Wed April 12, 1995 4:30 pm,

One of my stories if you want the long version.. :)

I drove into work at Dominos like the previous 6 1/2 years. Now anyone who has ever walked thru a bar at 12:45 looking for who ordered this pizza knows how stressful this can be. I worked 5:00 pm till 2-3 am in the city.

It is not so much the public (I learned in over 30,000 deliveries, that anyone, even Charlie Manson for example (if I was delivering to Spawn Ranch hehe) could be dealt with. People, almost always treat you the way you treat them for that first impression. Yes you have to kiss lots of ass but you walk out in one piece. :) But you get tired.. That is the hardest part of any job.. keeping the hours.

I used to come home so angry sometimes I would scream and yell at the walls. Yes I had a few people where things went wrong. Stress baby. (The "what went wrong" stories.. that's another thread :)

Anyhow I spent 30 mins taking very complicated orders. For some reason the owner was in and gave me some guff about a small mistake. (Even tho only someone of my knowledge at that point could take all these orders without making an address mistake or an ingredient mistake.

I took one run. I boiled over. I came back, through the hotbag down and said I'm out of here. No 2 week notice. :upsidedow So I burned that bridge. No past employer recommendation for me.

I floated around and gambled for a year, then came the internet.

Today.. as the one guy said, failure is not an option.

The great thing is, little did I know on 4/12/95 as I was driving home thinking wtf did I just do, ( I was well liked and a top employee at a pretty kushy job at that point) I could have just went to Network Solutions and got some great domains. It showed me there is always opportunity somewhere, you just don't know about it.

There is always ying and yang. When your luck swings one way it must swing another way. It is best to have middle of the road luck. But one time in your life you have to give "ying" a boot in the pants..

If I hadn't followed my gut and did something really dumb at the time I wouldn't be here. It was the turning point and best day of my life.

That was the ying. The yang was Network Solutions. (occurring simultaneously) My opportunity knocks once. By the time I figured it out in say 1998, the best was gone.

My real "opportunity knocks once" was of course the internet. Net Sol was just the rainbow I couldnt see on that cloudy day.

I've been running my paysite as a full time occupation over the last 5 years and making ALOT more money than I ever made at my previous jobs. :)

100% self employed, but most of my money is coming from a printing business I own these days. Too bad because both industries are in pretty bad shape... :)

What a great thread - good topic digitaldivas

Luckily I had my contemplative 'medicine' tonight :)

I've been full-time in adult since 1997.

Over 10 years self employed.

All I see in failure it's success so...

Started my first limited company when I was 20... now 33 and 5 companies later, 1 or 2 bumps in the road.. get up and dust yourself off and go again! started blue pixels in july 06, not had any outside help/second job for 13 years now... dont think i could ever go back! I have a home in Thailand and England and live the life of riley so I guess thats successful!

I haven't worked a "real job" since late 2001.

im an alcoholic and i cannot wake up morning, so i must be self employed. and yes, i have one warn food daily

Good thread :)

I have been working online since 1994 and it's been a blast....

Three years now iv been self employed and it rocks ..most of the time anyway but you def have to work a lot harder than being employed

people in this thread are top notch ice cream of the industry!

Began slowly working for myself in 1997 and went full time & quit my last "job" in '02.
Since then I've had boom years and lean years, but it's always been pretty much by choice. My dedication to it comes & goes in waves. Every couple of years or so I just get burned out and have to slow down and take more chill time than usual, and that usually translates into some big changes in the way I do things by the time I get fully geared up again.
But that works for me because my primary motivation has never been lust for more & more money. Being rich and being a peer-perceived "pimp" is not a requirement of mine, only being happy. I do this stuff strictly because I hate having "The Man" telling me when to eat, shit & sleep. And now, after doing this for so long, I am pretty much unemployable by the typical "job" because, a) I no longer have the mindset or will to punch a clock and bend over for some douchebag on a power trip, and b) I'm fully tattooed right down to my fingertips.

:2 cents:

Don't forget residual income....

thanks luv$. it is just really nice and inspirational to hear everyone's stories, since we are all some piece of the puzzle that is online adult 2010, how ever we contribute. Seems like most of us have a common goal to maximize our businesses and stay self employed...

Are you photographer, producer, affiliate or backend?

fletch, what was the first thing you ever did in adult? or have you always done design?

Graphic Designer / Video Editor / Audio Designer

very cool :thumbsup

Retired from former job at the ripe old age of 37,
been full time self-employed and a fulltimer in this business since '98.

Great thread!
Treat this like a biz and it will work.

I got into this by mistake in 2002..lol Really enjoy it!

But hustled since a kid....only reason I ever got a real job was cause my dad was always on my case about it. One day I did the math and said fuck your so wrong.

self employed online has been my only income since 1998. started when i was 21, never really had a 'real' job outside of part time jobs in highschool.

residual income can come from #2 or #3. You will make residual income from your retirement savings as they grow from interest collected each year. You can also make residual income from your business and other business ventures like rental property etc...


fuck the "pimp" mentality. While those people are busy collecting fast expensive cars to park in their garage, I am socking away money for retirement. My investments go up invalue, their cars depreciate fast. Then they need cash and sell them off for pennies on the dollar. What a waste of hard work to just piss the money away. It's one thing to spoil yourself a little, but you need to have balance. You need to take your check and split up the money, % to pay bills, % to savings, % to retirement, % to having fun with.

I try to make more and more money not to impress anyone else other than myself. The more I can make, the bigger my snowball of investments and retirement grows and the faster I can get to the point my passive income pays my bills and later in life my investments buy me those fast cars (if i choose to buy them). I can then work if and when i want to and never have to worry about working for the man, or myself if I don't want to. That's my motivation.

A LOT of people miss this. They either fall into the "blow all my money on toys as fast as I make it" group or the " make enough money to build up a savings, then take some time off and use up what I saved", start over do it again...

Yeah my parents are really hard core christians. They complain until they ask if I can help them. I send them money and then they are all of the sudden "cool" with what I do for about a month :(

I agree Will. I have not gotten any "toys" really. I am being pretty smart with my money, out of paranoia and the fact that when I do finally "splurge", it will most likely be to get back to Los Angeles, or the valley more specifically. I am waiting until the economy is better, so not holding my breath on that one.

Ditto same years been working as a consultant for that long:thumbsup

i have been self-employed for 8 years. Love it, cant go back.

That said i have to supplement my income by licking pussy....













....ok so i just do the licking for fun.

Nice thread DD, good to see a lot of folks are making it on their own and doing well.

Last J-o-b I had was working with AVN, and was unceremoniously canned because my boss and I didn't see eye to eye. He fired me on a Monday at 6:30 pm after I got in all my sales then removed me from the database so I couldn't get credit or commish. That same week I was t-boned on the freeway by a drunk driver who totalled my car and I got some mean air bag burns and scars to prove it.

That's when I found out who my real friends were, and many of them are in the industry. Several of them tried to get me rep jobs for some good companies, but I didn't feel that's the way I wanted to go. Then Baddog invited me to Internext Vegas and took me to a number of VIP parties (like the moviepost dinner) and I met some key people who ended up giving me some independent work, and lo and behold, I created PR Kitty.

First couple years were tough, I didn't know too much about a whole lot when it came to traffic and affiliates but I knew about marketing and networking. The learning curve was intense, simultaneously each project I got paid on went to the next show so I could start being more visible as I got to know more and more decision makers in the biz. It was also a challenge to be taken seriously as a female in a male dominated world.

Moved my biz from LA to Tampa, since there is no state tax in FL, so its good to be incorporated here. Vegas has no state tax either but is too dry for my taste.

I wish I could say that things are easy now, but I still spend about 80% of my day online and hustlin', but I definitely would not trade it for anything. I miss the regular hours, steady paycheck, and inexpensive health insurance, but had I had that, I would not be leisurely typing this from my bed in the middle of the afternoon nor would I have had nearly any of the cool adventures in far off places with people from all over the world I can call friends.

very cool!