I feel your pain on that one. So many ways to make money, but only so many hours in a day.

In a way that's kind of sad because I think all want to have a better tomorrow.

I'm not lecturing anybody it was just my thoughts but it seems it will never work.

eh, another hour of reading this thread
and you guys are all still playing the BLAME GAME

wrong approach.

you got a point

i think that sounds silly. The entire industry is doing shitty because of unqualified webmasters being in the industry. ? i kinda see where your coming from but i think the reason is very simple.

When money was good nobody was giving away full length videos, now they are, the money is drying up. pretty simple.

You know it!

Poor Shap,

He started this thread and hasn't had a chance to get off his computer.

Major props to you buddy for answering everyone and for a great turnout on a business thread.

LOL Actually I bought a new computer so I have to transfer all my stuff over and I have a bunch of email and paperwork to handle before I leave for the Bahamas tomorrow. This thread has been my escape from it all this week :winkwink:

Thanks Man! Btw I look forward to the day we finally meet.

identifying what the problems are is the first step to finding a solution. Pointing out what the problems are does not = blame game.

Making excuses is when people point to the problems as to why they are not successful. What people are doing here is pointing out the problems so they can in turn find a why to innovative and fix or work around them.

+1 :thumbsup

It's only been what, about 10 years.
Take off already, get out. Go enjoy your trip. Turn your bot on. Let it finish up the rest of this thread. :1orglaugh

nice post

are you fatfoo's brother?

people have been pointing out "what the problems are" for the last year.

just because Shap was ordered to make this thread to rehash a year-old problem doesn't mean it is new. let him go golf while we find the solution.

porn is boring. that is the only problem.

I wasn't ordered to do anything. That was a joke man :thumbsup

lol ya i want people to start pushing forward is all. been hearing about tubes killing the industry for a year. now its time to take it to the next level. porn always leads the way. this is no exception. mainstream is suffering too. we have the answers.

10000% agree. One problem imop is the people with the means and brains to innovate are lacking the drive and fire they once had. They've made a lot of money and the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow isn't as big right now :disgust

ya i spend a lot of my time trying to get clients to push forward, try new things, and move into the future. they just dont have the money, the time or the interest. ce la vie.

See? It's comments like these that make 'taking it to the 'next level'' so difficult.

Innovate! Push forward! try new things!!

Right, okay....like WHAT? Specifically. Go ahead, Mr. 'prin is boring' yet 'we have all the answers'. Go ahead, list five or six things ANY Webmaster can do RIGHT NOW, today, to 'push forward".

YOU don't know, NO ONE fucking knows, and we're all looking for these magical 'ways to push forward and innovate'. NOTHING is working 'cause if anything WAS working enough of us on here are smart enough to pick up on it and run with it.

So saying 'try new things!' is, ultimately, just as unhelpful as 'blame the tubes'-type excuses.

Is the porn industry dying ... or is it changing?
Smith-Corona thought the Typewriter Industry was dying, Hewitt-Packard thought it was changing.

It depends how you define whether an industry is dying. Do you define it by consumption numbers? Or by the revenues it generates?

There is no question segments of the industry are dying. At the same time more people than ever are consuming porn. Tough to say an industry is dying when consumption of it is on the rise.

There's more people than ever online. So porn "consumption" is naturally gonna rise. Problem is they don't have to pay to "consume" it anymore. It's become a free lunch buffet.

fuck this thread is more depressing than anything else

imo: low entry barrier + copy/paste biz practices + failure to innovate & experiment are the cause.

if it were simply free porn & tubes i don't think i would have gone from weekend warrior to full timer in under 2 years.

:2 cents:

"Try new things" and "innovate" don't have to mean "find a whole new traffic source" or "write some new software that automates everything". Trying new things can mean consolidating functions so certain efforts can be streamlined thereby cutting costs. For example, say a skilled marketer is having problems maintaining production along with day to day business management and cannot afford the staff necessary to meet deadlines much less sales goals. That person might consider outsourcing the content management at a fraction of the time and expense of managing in house staff.

Innovation can mean look at new ways to convert the traffic you already have or learn a new skill set for building traffic - if tgp worked yesterday and blog works today but facebook is looking good for tomorrow then where is your effort best going to be spent adopting a new skill set to deal with that potential revenue source.

Great example. I have another.

As a Grateful Dead fan I not only made hundreds of FREE bootlegs but I traded with friends for years. However many shows I can get for free I still choose to make purchases of specific shows. Why? Quality is one reason. I like the packaging and extras and/or I like the convenience of being able to get it on demand right at the show.

The point is content is still king but all the emporors with no clothes better stop flattering themselves that they know everything and start really paying attention to the masses if they want the masses to start paying them cash for content.

Great thread Sean.

For many years there has been a group of people in this industry that landed in the right place at the right time. There is no doubt the business has evolved into a real business.

For me the writing on the wall was similar to certain categories of software. There was a time when people paid for calendar software, now it's free so nobody buys the paid calendar software. This put companies worth hundreds of millions of dollars out of business.

I think the free line has been moved too far in this industry. I think the survivors will be companies like yours that offer unique and premium content, live content, or interactivity of some nature.

Thank You and Most Excellent! Exactly what I was looking for - concrete examples. The fact that they match my own inner instincts is a bonus. LOL

I spend roughly 2-4 hours every day, depending in the tasks, doing my 'bread 'n butter' work. I'm sure many of you also do, and I'm sure many have figured out (or are starting to) a way to automate these tasks. MY 'solution', as best as I can calculate it, is if I hire someone in the Phillipines or India (tho India is getting more pricey) they could do the work for me and cost maybe $200 a week to do so. This would free app. 15-20 a week of my time! Worth it? I'm thinking yes...

Until now ALL my sites, everything, have been 'clean', meaning without aff links, or upsells, or cross-sells, or anything inside the mem areas but content, etc. But now I'm considering doing something with all my exit traffic (50,000+ uniques network-wide), partnerships, etc. But how to do it tastefully, as in not to piss of surfers/members and add to the 'bombardment'?

PS Dead fan: ICQ me sometime and I'll share with you the day i interviewed Jerry Garcia and Bob Weir backstage in the Long Island Colliseum back in '91, just me & Bob & Jerry & my giant-titted girlfriend, who Jerry kept staring at through his (literally) rose-colored shades, until one of his 'assistants' came in, mid-way, and handed jerry a big, fat....ICQ me, not for public consumption. LOL

Few things... one that sounds like an awesome story which I would love to hear but I don't use icq anymore... if you don't mind stooping to im then mine is hgtimlake at hotmail. Next, I think I know a great site that wouldn't piss off your surfers if you offered it on those exits... ;-) And I know a way to tastefully please your surfers but also have the advantage of a legal, still is, and always will be visa friendly upsell using our content consoles with a affprog link.

For us, foriegn outsourcing has had mixed results. We determine it on a case by case basis and have found them to be sort of inconsistent - especially since you have little to no control over their employees coming and going, sometimes leaving you to an inferior programmer, etc.

lol, somehow after Mountain Girl I always knew Garcia was a boob lover...

Far L Kicks Ass! That's all i have to say :thumbsup

I fucking hate ICQ but a lot of ppl use it so....

Business to discuss to best to talk via email at first - although a Hotmail IM one-off sounds dirty enough for me to try. :) Maybe after I get through the weekend.....

themisterpeabody at gmail and we'll take it from there. LOVE HomeGrownVideo so totally open to your ideas.

And yes, outsourcing always worries me but the alternative - finding a paid intern, maybe - is also problematic. Finding semi-skilled labor willing to do boring, repetitive work for a low salary is getting harder to find every day. :D

lamo, so the only problem we face is porn is boring, if you believe that then fatfoo's bot is smarter than you.


my response was to your comment that " another round of blame but no solutions". You can't talk about solutions without talking about the problems as well. I believe there has been a lot of people talking about solutions here. If people choose to act on them, that's up to them.


So if "we" have the answers, then what do you think they are. How do we make porn unboring so everything can be fixed ??? you want to bitch at the people who are talking about problems and trying to come up with solutions. What do you think the solutions are. why don't you contribute instead of just bitching??? or are you just mad because you don't have the answers yourself and you waiting for someone to tell you what they are so you can follow their lead?

Heh heh - meow! Ka-ching!!
will76 make fatfoo bot his bitch make plsure his king. :D

first, calm down and have a drink. panic wont help you at all. next, come up with a way to get your surfers back hourly. unless you do, your site(s) is BORING.

ok that's 2. you'll have to pay me for 4 more :winkwink:

:banana ya

if u were smarter this convo would be a lot easier for me. :321GFY

no genius, i want to bitch at the people who are talking about problems. period.

#1 if u want to be a dick dont reply to my posts. its not constructive.

#2 we all know the fucking "problems"

#3 there is a solution - or at least a way forward - but im sure not going to discuss it with an asshole.

unnecessary dickishness. we've all seen your sites. you have no reason to be cocky.

Since simple minds like to number things, both so they won't forget their 'brilliant' points and to make themselves seem smarter, I will number my responses for you to comprehend:

1. Saying 'do something to make your surfers come back hourly" is retarded, vague, the exact kind of dumb-ass statement that brought this wrath down on you in the first place and utterly insane. How many porn surfers visit the same site every fucking hour? You're whack.

2. If you think the look of a website indicates its' success then you are twice the moron I assumed you are.

3. Will76 has offered far more insightful comments than you have, contributed to this discussion, and has proven himself through his words to "get it". You, however, are a putz.

Shap numbers most of his posts. dont be an asshole.

#2 the rest of your post is just stupidity.

PLAIN MOTHER FUCKING RIGHT :mad:

No doubt!

During the late 1990's Playboy started seeing a decline in sales. Was the porn industry dying then? Obviously not. Certain companies saw this as an opportunity and made a killing I think we are simply seeing another shift in the paradigm ( I can't believe I got to use that word).

All print media has been forever changed by the internet. It will be very difficult for newspaper and magazine publishers to ever recover subscription revenue.

Most people do not care to pay for news online nowadays either, because like porn, it is also free on so many sites.

I think mainstream can make up some of the losses by generating mainstream advertising revenue however, which is not as easy in adult.

Artists have been hit hard by the internet as well, thanks to music piracy. They can still make bank on live performances though... also unlike porn.

Im newer to the industry, and Ive noticed this as well. Coming from running a mainstream business (developing eLearning systems for the government on contracts) to the adult web business, my husband and I brought along our past experience of adaptability, hard work, and long-term goals. But as we networked, come to find out, many people in (web) adult had no real concept of professional business practices, trend analysis, ect...

Unfortunately for newer businesses like ours that have a more modern and fluid business model, the gatekeepers of many high traffic sources still function a bit in the past. I need 50,000 people a day exposed to my work and brand, not 2000. Thats our major barrier. But, the answer is simply 'give it time'. The market always evolves and fixes itself, its just a long process sometimes.

Lets make a new advertising model that replaces TGP. I think that goal is a good start to "upgrading" our marketplace.

His points are our exact strategy... David shoots all the content, and spends hours on each set in the digital darkroom, making sure the quality is as high as he can get it. And we delete emails from folks trying to sell us their content.

Are you sure about that? How do you know what their actual business practices are?

For instance, when most folks in this business see me...it's at a webmaster show and I'm having drinks and acting the fool. They have zero idea of what my day to day business is like.

Also, as far as "trend analysis" or A-B testing and other such things...some of us have been doing this online for a looooonnnnngggg time. I have promoted so many programs over so many years and have seen what works and what doesn't work with porn.

I have enough experience to know what I'm doing without doing further testing. I have basically "tested" for 14 years. 99.9 % of the time I know what is going to work and what won't work as far as marketing.

Not saying that doing analysis of stats and testing things isn't important or good business practice. But you get to a point where you master something and you can cut right through all of that and implement stuff quickly and make it happen.

I guess I'm just saying...don't underestimate the people in this business based on posts by some of the folks on here who like to stroke their own egos by claiming that THEY are the ones with all the business acumen.

I can tell you from first hand experience that there are a LOT of smart people who can run circles around most people in this business. No, they aren't successful just because they are "lucky" or some such thing.

If it were so easy back "in the day" to make all that money...then why was it only a handful of us who were successful while THOUSANDS of webmasters failed miserably? Just like now. :)

Actually Robbie when I've talked to you and your lovely wife, Claudia Marie, at shows you seem like you're having a good time, but you're promoting your site and networking in a coherent and (appropriately) informal way.

In that case I will increase my alcohol consumption. :1orglaugh

sounds about right.

I disagree.
On the internet, one of the main advantages was being there first.
The guys who registered valuable domains 15 years ago are now all either sitting on millions or made millions. That does have not much to do with being an entrepreneur.

They would all disagree strongly, a lot of them have taken up blogging and writing long formal self-congratulatory treatises about their entrepreneurial abilities.

The reality is if they had to start over again today with equal means they wouldn't be able to make a penny.

Don't forget that 99.99% of ALL business is that way. It's the guy who was smart enough to see the future and got there FIRST that makes the money. Hell, it just happened again a couple of years ago when Brazzers got Pornhub to explode. I never saw it coming. Wish I had.

And you can apply that "if they had to start over again today with equal means they wouldn't be able to make a penny" to any successful person in most businesses.

Think about it. If Sam Walton were alive today and tried to start from scratch to build something SIMILAR to WalMart...he wouldn't be able to do it. Why? Because WalMart already exists and he wouldn't be bringing anything innovative like that to the table.

Don't discount people's intelligence and business savvy just because it looks easy to you from the outside looking in. Even guys who did nothing more than buy a bunch of domain names 15 years ago...they had the foresight that you and I did NOT have to do so.

And in any industry or business in the world...that's called being smart. If all the people on GFY who constantly try to pump themselves up as being great "businessmen" had half the instincts of a really successful businessman...then they too would have made all the right moves at the right times. They would have done it back then...and they would be doing it right now. Just my observation. The most successful guys in the world do work hard, but a LOT of what they do is pure gut instincts and aggressiveness. Shit you can't learn or teach or analyze.

We ALL have access to the same data that a guy like Warren Buffet has if we want it. But yet, he knows what to do to make money. Some people are just like that. Some people are Donald Trump, and others...no matter how many books they read or statistics they analyze or A -> B testings they do...never are.

Well, I wouldn't consider the elderly old man down the street that bought early lakefront property to be a real estate expert or entrepreneur - he got lucky, plain and simple. Money unfortunately makes people like that lazy and willfully ignorant and he is the last person I would take real estate advice from in 2010.

Luckily he doesn't write pompous essays about entrepreneurship, industry expertise and how he saw it all coming in his crystal ball like certain old domainers do.

It's a case by case situation. I was talking about big time success. Having said that though...how do you really know how sharp and on the ball that elderly guy was back when he bought that property?

Nobody said anything about people having to be up to the minute business monsters right now. My soliloquy was about the business sense of a person to have the foresight and smarts to do things at the right moment.

Sure, if you pull something great and sell it off and make millions and retire...then you would have to get a lot of the rust off to jump back in the game. But guys like Trump and Buffet who stay in the game and work all the time now are still smart as hell and can kick ass. Elderly old guy who is retired? Maybe not so much. :)