Hi all, newbie here to the forum. We all know the common saying on the internet is that "no one pays for porn" or "I've never paid for porn" or "have people who pay for porn ever heard of the internet?" Between all the torrent sites and the tube sites and the piracy, I don't see how the industry is staying solvent. Physical media sales are enough to keep the industry afloat for now, but I don't see this lasting. The industry is going to have to figure out an internet-only (or 95% internet-based) model. So I'm curious from a purely intellectual perspective - how do porn studios plan to continue to make money? What could the business model *possibly* be at this point with all this free stuff floating around courtesy of the internet and easily pirate-able content? Like a Netflix for porn? Are web hits and advertising enough to keep it afloat? Even litigation isn't really effective as we can see from the MPAA's and RIAA's track record. Their stuff still gets pirated all the time. And litigation is expensive. I often imagine what would happen if I were to spend all that time to create a video and post it on my site for subscribers. The next day I'd probably see a copy of it floating on the internet somewhere, stripped of whatever protections I had on it. It would be horrible. Someone linked me to this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U114qDMORFM 61 likes and *237 dislikes* WTF? The top comment being "get a real fucking job" :( Porn is in high demand, yet the consumers don't respect those that provide the things they enjoy. While we're at it, I'm SUPER confused about how Brazzers can own, what is it, Pornhub? A content producer that owns a tube site that streams pirated stuff? Huh? I have to be missing something. Enlighten me! Edited by - somerset on Jul 29 2012 Edited by - somerset on Jul 29 2012 Edited by - somerset on Jul 29 2012 Edited by - somerset on Jul 29 2012 Edited by - somerset on Jul 29 2012
Well, you're talking about the future of the all intellectual-property related businesses: music, movies, porn, books, magazines... The problem is that the internet made those works, economically speaking, "public goods", just like TV broadcasts. Until now, all those industries have tried to reverse this situation by building electronic fences (DRMs, etc.) in order to prevent their products from becoming public goods. What we've been seeing for the past decade is a struggle between industries and pirates over what model is better for everyone. I think there are two types of pirates: 1) Those who think free as in freedom 2) Those who think free as in free beer And I think the latter are abusing the former. If there was an ultimate service available at a reasonable fee, piracy would be severely reduced. For example, I love everything digital (I hate physical media like DVD), but I also hate buying a digital album, lose the files, and have to pay to download again. iTunes and Spotify are two of the first services that really made it worth for me. I know I can buy apps, music, or whatever, and really use it the way I want to use it. Alternatively, it would be interesting to consider some kind of global license: get paid at the source. Last, although piracy is an annoying thorn, I think internet-only porn producers are doing ok, and pornhub are actually helping them earn more money. Not everything is black and white, there are no "good guys" on one side and "bad guys" on the other. Edited by - Jambavant on 7/29/2012 5:27:11 AM
Yeah. I personally don't think electronic fences are the solution. Completely revamped business models are. Fences will always be bypassed. Always. Business models not so much. It'll be the new business model in competition with the piracy model, and they're competing along the classic 4 P's. Product, Price, Promotion, Place. I'm just going to come out and say I think subscriptions to streaming services is the way to go. 1. Instant access to what you want to view, and you don't have to go anywhere. You've be viewing the video on the internet anyway. I think the companies who do the "one membership gets you membership to all these sister sites" is going about it correctly. You want subscriptions but you also don't want people to buy too many different subscriptions. In fact, just a handful of quality subscription services with a vast selection of content is enough. Basically, a *studio agnostic* subscription service. Not a Brazzers service or a Wicked service, but a third party independent provider that has both Brazzers and Wicked and whoever else on tap. Consumers like a one stop shop and it's only a matter of time before someone sees value in providing such a service. Maybe there's already something like that. I don't know. I remember there used to be such a service. 2. "App Stores" Make it damned easy and cheap to purchase content on your device and available immediately for consumption and have it linked to your user account. Set your device on fire? No problem. The content that you paid for is always on the cloud under your name. Basically, lower the barrier to purchase and usage so much that it's not worth the effort to try and pirate. Concessions on price are going to have to be made. Lower the price per unit in the hopes that you'll simply be able to sell more volume to *maybe* make up for it. But it's very possible that gone are the days of the huge revenues and margins that studios are used to, so people just have to be at peace with that. And then figure out a way to successfully operate on that level of revenue once it hits kind of an equilibrium. Edited by - somerset on 7/29/2012 6:35:20 AM
I really think the solution is to offer the porn easily and at good price. For Example, Evil Angel updates their site alot with most of their new DVDs making it to the site quite fast. It also cost only 100 dollars/euros a year so really good price. At those prices it is just so much easier to get a membership on EvilAngel than try and hunt down their releases on Pirate sites. Also some websites offer free liveshows to members and i think this is a very good idea too. Only thing i wonder is why so few sites dont have a place on their website where members can give them ideas and where they would actually listen and do some of them and communicate with the members there.
This may be the best hope for the industry. You may want to read The Long Tail, which I borrowed from the library a few years ago, but would probably download to my iPad today. Basically, he argues that the internet allows you to serve niche markets, and that the key to success in this new world is developing tools that allow people to find what they are looking for. Part of the problem is that developing the streaming-Netflix of porn would take a pretty big investment. If Netflix offered porn today, the problem would be solved, but if Netflix had offered porn from day one, they wouldn't have succeeded. I have a PS3, and would probably check out Fyre TV if they had a PS3 ap. They've been saying it's "Coming Soon" for a very long time-- part of the problem may be capital, and part of it may be that Sony isn't cooperating. Another problem is privacy. My understanding is that porn sells pretty well when offered through hotel room cable boxes, but a lot of guys might not want to explain credit card charges to their wives or tell their children why they shouldn't click on the "Fyre TV" icon. I have the sense that the cam sites are doing well even though the majority of users never pay a penny, and they offer a pretty low-quality product. Interactive porn may be the ultimate solution, and technology could allow the development of new services. I could also imagine the companies moving to Vegas, setting up brothels and strip clubs, and offering free porn to advertise their real product. Still it's a very real problem. Porn thrived in the VHS and DVD era in part because it could be viewed in the privacy of your home, and in part because the VHS emerged during the "anything goes" 70's and 80's. Video stores all over America had a back room where you could go and browse. Times have changed, and Netflix and Amazon don't have a backroom for their streaming services.
I absolutely agree with the premise of Long Tail. Half the battle of, well, life really, is to find what you're looking for. Things are scattered all over the place in life. Whether it's information, that special someone, or that specific desire, you have to find it first. It's really difficult! I read that the only way Netflix was able to do the online streaming thing was that they amassed a lot of capital from their early physical media days. They used this to launch their online streaming service. No one has capital right now to start such a service for porn, as you said. FyreTV seems to be working? I wonder if any porn producer can put their stuff on FyreTV. FyreTV gets their subscription fee and they pay the producer a small sum for each time the video is viewed from a unique IP address. Privacy should be easy to deal with. A one time credit card charge from a generic sounding business name shouldn't arise too much suspicion, and I bet that the app icon could be made to look like something else or even hidden. And of course it would be password protected.
^ If I were doing it, I would offer something like what Amazon has. Have a set of videos that are available for free with subscription, and then allow either "rental" or "purchase" of high end titles. But it's a huge capital problem. First you need to build it, including inking the agreements with all the content providers-- who would likely consider it competition for their existing web-offerings-- then buy enough server space and bandwidth for a successful operation, then attract the customers. Then you need to survive in a rapidly changing industry. And you need to do all of this without the support of any of the big players in silicon valley or mainstream entertainment. If I were in the industry, I would try to get some of the key people in porn to sit in a room, and try to get them to invest and serve on the Board of Directors. But it would be hard to sell the concept. It's relatively easy to unite people around "Piracy is killing our business." Imagine asking people to eliminate their paid web-sites in favor of some risky joint venture. If you look at Fyre TV, it seems like they are just acting as resellers of the existing subscription services. I, for one, care much more about the girls than the producers. Also my mood shifts. For this to work, customers need to be able to watch what they want when they want it, and it needs to be pretty painless in terms of payment.
There are "NETFLIX" type porn sites that work on a similar business model. They work the same way. You pay a monthly fee and you have access to the movies/scenes they offer. You mentioned FYRETV, they're doing that. So that type of service is available even if it isn't offered by the mainstream treaming services. Anyone who's interested in such a service could easily find it if they looked. The "backrooms" are still there they just aren't connected to the big franchises. I think the streaming movies idea will only get stronger as people just get more comfortable with it. I think many people are still caught up in owning physical content/movies. But as companies like NETFLIX and AMAZON make streaming more common and many WIFI tvs, Blu-Ray players and streaming devices become more common we'll see the shift happen over time. Part of the problem happening now is there's so many streaming devices some streaming sites don't know which they should invest in. I have no idea how much money, equipment, and time it takes to be able to stream to each but I think it can be confusing to decide which they should go with. Yeah, most people have X-Boxes and PS3s in their homes but perhaps it hooked up to the family tv or in the kids room and that's not a good place to watch porn. But I think without a doubt free internet porn will be the hardest to overcome. As time goes on it will just become more and more common for people to simply get used to not buying porn. For most people porn isn't something they want to own and have laying around and they don't care about quality. If they can get what they want for free it'll be hard to convince them to start paying for it. Most people see it as disposable "entertainment" that they watch once for however long and then move on.
^ Part of the reason I mentioned the (im)possibility of Netflix or Amazon having a "backroom," is that people feel comfortable providing their credit card information to both companies. You may remember that shortly after Manwin bought DP, their (unencrypted?!?!) customer records got hacked. I've joined three pay sites in my life, and DP was one of them. I presume that my personal information-- including credit card info-- is now in the hands of the hackers. I regret that I ever joined, and I will think twice before giving my personal credit card information to another porn site. I've never thought twice about my Amazon Prime membership. I trust them. If they sold porn, I would buy it from them.
^Ive easily joined 20 to 30 diferent sites and not once as my credit been misued. Most paysites use very reliable CC processors who spend lots of money to make sure their customers information is kept secret.
When I said "people people feel comfortable" with Amazon, I meant to imply that this feeling might not be rational. The DP/Manwin screw up only highlighted these fears in me. Porn operates on the margins of Hollywood,and internet giants like Amazon won't work with the porn industry. I can't imagine that two years at Elegant Angel would boost up your resume for anyone who isn't committed to working in porn. While it may attract skilled and ambitious pornographers, it might not attract the most skilled and ambitious accountants, software developers, etc. Furthermore, criminals sometimes work on the margins of society, so people may suspect that porn companies are given to criminality. In the event of dishonest dealings, people may fear that they would be deterred from pursuing their rights because of potential embarrassment. None of this is rational, but I think the fears are real, and the porn industry can't thrive in the world of the internet unless it faces some of the obstacles in its path.
Porn websites in general do not inspire confidence. Too many times they have glaring technical shortcomings. If a porn website can't do the basic/simple things (for example, making problem-free videos for customer download), I don't trust them to have the wherewithal to do the relatively difficult stuff such as data security.
I felt comfortable providing my credit card information to Amazon. Someone hacked my account and bought XBox 360 points. After giving me the run-around for a week, Amazon finally said that they couldn't give me a refund and that I'd have to dispute the charges. This was three years ago, and I haven't so much as visited Amazon since then.
I think those sites like Brazzers (manwin etc) do very well. But even their stuff gets pirated pretty quickly. As regards the music model - No way Itunes sucks as you do nto own the song and they sell you a crappy 192 bite rate file. When they start selling lossless files that I can copy to my hard drive and backups etc, then I might think about it., But in my experience over the years, people will try to get things fro free if they can. How much would you actually pay for a high quality Asa Akira clip of your choice ? $1 ? $2 ? $5 ? Newspapers are struggling.
I think the streaming/downloading from a site method will be the main and most popular way to watch/own porn but it's going to take a long while to get there. If you think about how long it usually takes for people to transition from one form of media to another you'll see this will take awhile. It took a long time for people to make the switch from VHS to DVD to make DVDs the dominant media for movies. Newspapers, books and magazines are still going through the transition. With porn it's goig to be a slow transition because so many people are perfectly content with DVDs. Many people have already made the transition of buying online instead of going to a store so even though there are far less porn shops today DVDs still sell through online purchases. There's no real reason for some people to change that buying habit. That and the fact that DVDs are cheaper now. It's going the streaming sites really pushing the multiple advanges of streaming/downloading to get people to make the switch. And even then, some people just don't have the capability to stream. It's going to take awhile but I think streaming/downloading will be the more profitable way for porn studios to go. It's a much better business model but it just lacks the amount of people at this time to make it as profitable as it could be.
1) when you buy files on iTunes, you download them and you fully own that copy. There aren't DRMs on it. You can use it every which way you like. 2) files are in 256kb/s AAC ABR. This is much better than 192kb/s MP3 CBR. Few people can tell 256kb/s AAC and lossless apart. Before you even think about claiming you can hear the difference, take an ABX test. 3) iTunes offers backup of your songs. You can redownload them at no additional cost. Even better, buy on your PC, and it's instantly available on every iOS device you own.
I've got a good feeling about the impact that Augmented Reality glasses will have on the industry. The opportunities for porn and cybersex are really interesting. And we'll see continual convergence of AR glasses, streaming and toys. But the driver will be porn - stars, studio brands, etc ...
LA-based Analytics PhD. View my profile. 5 Posts 9/12
Posted - Sep 11 2012 : 12:57AM
Hi! It's my first post.The MPAA/RIAA comparison is valid, but the porn industry is in a more precarious position. This is because IP-based video distribution is now mature (YouTube, Vimeo) and the industry is *still* not as integrated into the mainstream content distribution network. Even if people pirate "Game of Thrones" on the internet, HBO still makes money through their partnership with cable companies' who have a monopoly on physical cables running into homes. Quite possibly more money than they would make in a subscription (Netflix) or a-la-carte (iTunes) model.+1I get what you guys are saying, but I think the capital barrier may be a red herring. Case in point: clips4sale. Before you flame me, I'm not arguing that the content on clips4sale is on par with what's produced by the major porn studios. It's clearly a different segment of the market -- the content generally is either very niche/fetish, of low production quality, or both. However, it's clear that the market functions -- the business model is viable. ~~~ * Can a pivot from physical media (DVD sales and rental) to a subscription model (content download and streaming) work? This is possible, but it doesn't solve the problem, namely that it's the same business model, just in a different medium. To make things worse, piracy is easier and more rampant in the new medium. There's also the production-side and consumer-side switching costs of moving from DVD to online. It will be slow and expensive. * Can a pivot from physical media (DVD sales and rental) to an a-la-carte model (content download and streaming) work? Again, yes. Consumers in mainstream content consumption (iTunes) have shown they're willing to take this option over piracy if it's easy enough to use. The porn studios need to be careful if they go this way though... the market maker will be increasingly favored over the content producers (contrast Apple/RIAA/MPAA vs. Hulu/Fox/ComCast). Things to think about: does this pivot require more innovation and risk-taking than the porn studios are willing to accept? How does it impact brand image? How does coalition (a la Hulu) and consolidation (Manwin) figure in? * Can a pivot to a more demand-slanted / crowd-funded model work? Even more radical than the a-la-carte model, we also have the fiverr/kickstarter/offbeatr crowdfunded model. It has some really nice properties: 1. Customers tell you exactly what they want. 2. Content production can be pre- and over-funded. 3. It's cheap for current producers to try. *However* the barrier to entry for new producers is also low... 3a. ...increasing competition (more efficiency, better quality and prices) 3b. ...and driving innovation (more types of content) Things to think about: Can current producers hold ground against upstarts breaking into the space? Are there side-effects on brand image? Do they have a choice?
I think they need to focus everything they have on fully legalizing prostitution in every state and use the porn for advertising for their girls. Edited by - randomprecision on 9/11/2012 8:38:38 AM
Streaming is not for everyone.I like dvds you put them in the dvd player and they play.Streaming you absolutely have to have high speed internet or you are not going to be able to enjoy content.Every porn fan does not have high speed internet or wants to pay for it every month.You can't hide internet porn from your girlfriend or wife on family pc or laptop.But you can hide a dvd in attic in cd collection or in myriad of places.Internet porn is full of viruses just waiting to fuck your computer up.Dvds can be easily played in your laptop.
I always enjoy discussions like this. I get a kick out of the fact that fans think free porn is free. Nothing is free in this world. Do you guys think that one day "Porn Santa Claus" woke up and decided that all porn should be free ? The future of porn is data mining. Do you not think that when you download videos from torrents or go to tubesites to watch free scenes that your information is not being collected ? Cookies, tracking codes, sniffing codes ect...Porn is the new social media for collecting information. Granted there is some profit made on the advertising - just like Facebook makes some money off ads but the real value in a free internet is to those that want information on you - its users. That information can be sold and resold. The "raincoaters" use to worry about being seen by their kid's teacher walking into their local DVD store. No those same fans freely go to tubesites to watch their favorite videos and they are being watched at all times. And if you have a webcam built into your computer, that webcam can be turned on and manipulated remotely - so in all actuality - you can really be watched and recorded. How many here read the TOS of each website they visit ? Michael AdultBizLaw.com
^ wow, that's the saddest post I've read this year. It's both demeaning for Interrs in general, and an overt attempt to play off on fear to fence the sheep in.
Always nice to see your posts and have you add your perspective. I'm not sure I understand where you're going with this. I understand the Facebook/Google data mining and how it ties back to focused advertising, but I'm not sure how it would work in porn. Who would they sell the data to or how would they monetize the clicks? Facebook and Google both have mainstream companies willing to pay to place ads based on the mined data. Not sure that same market exists in porn, but I'd be very curious to understand how you see it working.
Not sure I agree with this. I understand the idea, but Apple's latest laptops don't even have optical drives, iPads don't have any drives. I think you're seeing the end of physical media. The future is cloud storage like it or not. The iPhone 5 (or whatever they're going to call it) releases tomorrow and my bet is on USB3 capabilities and LTE. Whatever the model for the future is for porn it has to be able to be downloaded to a portable device over the internet. You may not like it, but the rest of the world is already there.
Great first post! Congratulations. I hadn't thought about using the crowd-funded model for porn. Seems like a novel concept.....not sure it would work, but it's something new to throw out onto the table. Thanks for the idea.
LA-based Analytics PhD. View my profile. 5 Posts 9/12
Posted - Sep 12 2012 : 12:38AM
I didn't want to open with this topic as it seems tangential to the thread, but if we're going there... I absolutely agree. Riffing on what I wrote yesterday about the market maker increasingly dominating the interaction (Metcalfe's Law states that the value of the network increases with the square of the number of peers, i.e. F(n)=n^2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metcalfe's_law), it's pretty obvious that as the number of peers increases, the market maker will want to extract more value per user => profiling. It's not something to be afraid of, necessarily. User behavioral analysis is a tool like any other, and can be used to serve and exploit the end user, or both at the same time. In the spirit of keeping the conversation constructive, an example of a good use of the technology in the context of adult is discoverability and promotion. I'll elaborate later, and if it's more appropriate to open a new thread please do and link it here, thx. -noos
I guess that's not what they're trying to do there. I don't know. It makes sense to me that when the door starts to close for the business to make money off of digital "content" (Which isn't really content at all and therein lies the problem) they need to start thinking about falling back on what their real product is. Sex. You can't digitize the real thing. Yet. Edited by - randomprecision on 9/12/2012 3:20:46 AM
LA-based Analytics PhD. View my profile. 5 Posts 9/12
Posted - Sep 12 2012 : 3:26AM
Are you watching what's going on with live virtual sex and teledildonics? AEBN opensourced the RealTouch earlier this year. A good blog to follow is http://www.slashdong.org/ Edited by - noos on 9/12/2012 3:27:16 AM
I'm sure there's a lot of truth here but of course, this is something that applies to the internet in general, regardless of how you use it. Unfortunately, it isn't just the fact that it would obviously be embarrassing if your friends at work knew what you masturbate to that people need to be worried about. Though that's obviously a legitimate concern. A lot of people say if you aren't doing anything wrong there's nothing to worry about. And in the meantime, the internet is sucking up every trace of information it can get about them. And it's getting more sophisticated every day. Call me crazy but I don't think you can predict what kind of information (info that most people consider to be private but don't realize it really isn't) might come back to bite you in the ass in 10 years.
I'm vaguely aware that they're working on it. But it's going to be a really long time before they can manufacture anything that even comes close to fucking a real woman. There's a good reason why we aren't all watching cartoon porn.
Sorry if you think information is demeaning. But this thread did provoke a discussion yesterday with my research assistant so I decided to write an article. Jambavant you may not want to read it though - it might be too scary. LOL Privacy & Porn: Is Free Internet Porn Really Free ? AdultBizLaw.com Michael
LA-based Analytics PhD. View my profile. 5 Posts 9/12
Posted - Sep 14 2012 : 12:23AM
Skimmed the article (http://adultbizlaw.com/?p=1065), seems some legitimate concerns, although it seems to me that online privacy is quickly becoming an antiquated idea. Users for the most part seem to be willing to give up personal info in exchange for better service (case in point: the rise of the freemium business model). Collecting data and profiling users can be effectively used by online porn businesses to increase retention and drive down acquisition costs. I've personally demonstrated the validity of this approach as a previous owner of a very large tube site. I thought about starting an intro "hello" thread about my background in online porn and why I'm here (maybe I'll do it later) but thought it would be better to add some value to a conversation and make some friends first. Hello, friends! :-) Anyway, users really like data-mining assisted content discovery. A few examples: 1. active search, i.e. keywords. It's amazing how poorly every pay site and tube site (except mine) implements this, yet how straightforward it is to do. 2. passive search, i.e. "more videos like this". No one does this well -- but I did, and it led to a major increase in session duration and frequency. Leverages Metcalfe's Law. 3. community building, i.e. "help me find some friends who like similar content to me" -- see point 2, leverages Reed's Law. 4. crowdsourced content tagging. Users are willing to explicitly tag content and comment on content. You can learn a lot about content and users at the same time by seeing what they do / what kinds of comments get attached to a particular piece of content. 5. content scoring. Like point 1, it's amazing how poorly it's done, yet how straightforward it is to do, e.g. How not to sort by average rating. I could go on. These are really just the user-facing discovery-flavored aspects of how user data can be collected and recycled to the benefit of all. There's a whole set of other techniques that can be employed (on the same collected data) that have direct financial applications. -noos
Care to state what tubesite you owned ? Or at least whether it was a legal or illegal tubesite ? That would help foster the discussion. Michael AdultBizLaw.com
LA-based Analytics PhD. View my profile. 5 Posts 9/12
Posted - Sep 14 2012 : 4:11AM
The specific tube site doesn't really matter for the sake of this discussion. I just mentioned this now so others can more easily relate to my perspective. I've tried to make statements that can stand on their own and without reference to specific sites. If I wrote something above that needs more context, I'm happy to expand generically on the point. Are you aware of any vendors offering exceptionally good service built on mined data? I would be so happy to see this happening both as an entrepreneur and customer. Edited by - noos on 9/14/2012 4:38:02 AM
My article was not about cookies as they related to the experience of the surfer. The topic of this thread is about the future of the business. Cookies and data mining/selling advertising to mainstream companies on porn sites is the future of the business. Thats how the free model will survive - for a few large companies. Of course improving the experience for the surfer will improve the chances they visit a site more often. Which can lead to more advertising and data mining possibilities. I ask which tubesite you owned since you know who I am and my perspective. Knowing whether your tubesite used licensed content vs. stolen content will put your opinions into perspective. If you no longer own it then certainly there is no harm in stating which one. Michael AdultBizLaw.com
