I'm sure that is all true. Why bother making content, building sites, dealing with compliance, models, editing, uploading etc when you can just blackmail random john does into paying bills.

It makes perfect sense.

Sounds like a retirement plan to me! I'm not going to feel sorry for "random john does" who willfully chose to steal my content, just as they don't feel sorry for me when they steal it. :2 cents:

Steve Lightspeed

What comes after pride again?

Lots of bumming.

Governments and laws oversee and regulate every other aspect of our lives. In fact I can't think of one instance other than the Internet that's not regulated. In porn we are more regulated than most.

Do we all live in a police State, do we fear a knock on the door from the big bad man from the Government. Are we able to run our businesses and make a living. Can we buy a porn mag, film or what ever we can if it's legal. Can we get on with our lives in freedom?

Yes of course we can. To all those questions.

So what has an unregulated got us?

A place where scammers, thieves and scum flourish.

I've made money in the offline porn industry for decades. A place where regulation was accepted and complied to. Don't fear it if you're honest.

Yes what we all need to do is to put more free content in places teaching people they don't have to pay for it. :upsidedow

QFT :thumbsup

coffee spat out lol

thanks

Damian is now preaching morals to an industry where some have made scamming surfers an art form. Sponsors and affiliates who sent them traffic.

Misleading tours.
Sites filled with nothing but garbage.
Sites with garbage and loads of banners to other sites.
Mis use of credit card information.
Pre clicked join boxes.
Selling dating sites that have very few if any females.
Targeting surfers telling them there is a girl in the next town looking for them.
Sending out emails to keep those people spending money.
Shaving affiliates.

And probably more I have not thought of.

Now he's up in arms that this industry should be targeting pirates to make them pay for the content they downloaded.

Yes piracy of content always existed. The Internet turned it into an a billion dollar industry.

Really? THAT is your argument?

"It is acceptable to be immoral and blackmail random people with the SOLE intention of extracting money from them because some other people in the industry had nefarious practises in the past"

?


Do you need a hand to clutch at those straws or are you managing?

Warning: Robbie and his Russian buddy get easily confused when presented with reality.

One of the most dangerous types of thinking a society can embrace. It's the words of dictators and 'all or nothing' thinkers. If we allow ourselves to be ruled by that type of mentality ("if you have nothing to hide then why not do as I say") then we are allowing a climate of corruption to flourish.

Paul I have nothing against you and actually agree with the majority of your posts in different threads. Especially about why the industry is in decline. I LOVE it when you talk about how shitty the product is. I wish it could be repeated everyday until it gets into everyone's heads.

I am against piracy and illegal downloading. As for 'this method' of fighting piracy I am very much against. And before you and Steve reply with, "well do you have any better ideas" ... no I don't. But a bad idea is still a bad idea. Even if there are no alternatives it doesn't mean that the current idea should be implemented.

:2 cents:

But you can't deny we live in a world controlled and regulated. Yet the press can bring down a President, debate whether Marilyn Munroe was killed be the CIA, people can march against Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan and any other thing they want to. We can buy porn from shops on the street and many other freedoms.

A free Internet has largely been taken over by scum.

And if you want it cleaned up the ONLY way it will be done is with Government action. The problem is that action will fall on Youtube as well as others. And they have the clout.

Until a better idea comes along this is all we have.

Really? Failed? How do you figure? Anti Piracy has actually been incredibly successful in mainstream for sales within the US...You are trippin dude.

You think because you can still find illegal copies of stuff online that the efforts of the RIAA and other anti-piracy groups and legislation have failed? Wrong my confused friend... Had these efforts not been undertaken piracy would have killed the recording industry DEAD.

QFT. Just because individual lawsuits may not have been won does not mean the campaign was a loss. Further Steve is talking about settling for far less then the music industry wanted. If people fear being sued they will look to legitimate avenues to buy like what happened with itunes exploding.

Steve may not have the best idea here but he has an idea and we wont know how good it is till it gets a bit further along. I applaud him for trying something and risking the backlash. To many sit around and complain this is one of the first things I have heard that actually may work.

Yeah I won't deny that. I realize we need regulation sometimes or else the offline and online 'scum' as you called it will wreak havoc.

My issue is not with regulation it's with the idea itself. I have 2 problems with it.

1- Are we sure the technology is sound? If not you can't just round up some innocents with guilty people no matter how small (well, maybe if it was 1:1 million) the number of innocents is.

2- The Blackmail. This is the worst part. The guilty person receives a letter in the mail saying that they were caught downloading illegally and if they don't pay, their name will be posted and EVERYONE will know they watch porn. Not everyone will know you downloaded a copyright file but that that you watch PORN. We live in a very judgmental society still, where being associated with porn (even though it's legal) has consequences. It can bring on issues with your family, friends, co-workers and you can even lose your job for it.

Now imagine that a person was caught downloading gay porn in an area where homosexuality is not tolerated. His life is ruined. Does he deserve that? To take it even further, imagine the guy is straight, high profiled and there was a mistake with the ISP traces. He never downloaded anything. And on and on.

To that I say instead of trying to embarrass/ruin people, if the technology is sound and if a person is caught tell them they can either settle by paying a certain amount or be charged and have their name public for downloading a 'copyright' file without specifying it is porn.

:2 cents:

not like they are going after the actual price amount of what was downloaded, they have worked out the exact price point at where a person gets a lawyer because actually going to court costs too much. no one ends up going to court. they get scared and settle or tell them to fuck off and nothing happens.

Because there is more piracy than ever before. See the recent news on the record breaking number of peers on *just* the pirate bay two weeks ago.

Do you have any citations for that, because the MPAA and RIAA say otherwise. Or are they jus' trippin', dude?

Were there efforts not intended to stop that happening? Or am I misunderstanding what "stopping piracy" means?

What efforts are you discussing? The P2P lawsuits that failed and cost them a fortune that they have ceased doing now?

@Markham
You live in an ex-communist country yet seem to be in favour of more government regulation?

He should move to China, all the internet regulation he could possibly want there.

Or Australia.

I remember marketing on surfer forums many years ago (2006). Even then they would complain if the clips weren't longer than three minutes or hosted on sites like Rapidshare. Even if I threw up a gallery with 12 one minute clips with thumbnail previews and a mere two standard banners there would be guys bitching about it being spam. Some would still bitch if it was only one banner ad.

I'm sure it's possible these days, especially if your goal is primarily introducing a brand but it's got to be pretty tough... I made some sales back then from it but I could feel the resistance and returns dropping over time until I gave it up. There's one forum in one niche that I do some subtle marketing with but the return for the time involved is barely worth it.

Not more. I would just like to see SOME.

Not to the extent that China takes it, just to the extent every country takes offline regulation. If you can't import, sell, publish it offline, why should you be able to do it online?

People, Damian has made numerous posts saying piracy isn't a lost sale. He's also made other stupid posts regarding piracy. He actually points out Brazzers make money from stealing. I can quote them if he argues. At best he's spineless and given in. At worse he supports piracy. Maybe he even fears getting a letter himself.

What he doesn't get is piracy has cost him $1,000s. Maybe he's glad to roll over and stick his ass in the air for the pirates to ream. Others have a bit more back bone.

You never get just SOME government interference.

Either they think something isn't worth doing anything about, or they go right to the point where you can't piss without getting permission from 3 different people first.

I was just really surprised given the country that you live in (no idea when you moved there though) that you would be in favour of governments sticking their nose into things. Maybe your neighbours would have different ideas.