Sunday, April 29, 2007
There is a major article on BDSM and the adult film industry in today's edition of the prominent and widely-read "New York Times Magazine."
"A Disciplined Business," by author Jon Mooallem, explores the legal, commercial, sexual and social impacts of BDSM pornography by looking at the history of Kink.com -- the largest and most successful site of its kind on the Internet.
Kink.com is notable because it is housed in the former San Francisco Armory, a major landmark in that city.
While there is much that is worthwhile in the article, I found this of particular interest:
The largest studios -- Falcon, Bel Ami, Titan Media and Channel One (new owner of All Worlds) -- struggle to deal with the Internet. Falcon, for example, can barely put streaming video online. It has a minimalist members-only section with little more than the odd photo and access to streaming video at a lower rate than the pay-per-view approach offered by its public pages. The other major studios have adopted approaches little different.
Few of the studios make it easy to access content online. Bel Ami spends about $75,000 on a film. Its duplicating costs are minimal, and it engages in almost no advertising or marketing. Bel Ami easily makes that budget back on American sales alone: "Lukas In Love" sold more than 2,500 copies at $60 a pop, netting $150,000 in gross revenues. It sold another 2,500 copies at retail (through retailers and to video stores), netting another $75,000 in gross revenues. You'd think the studio would make online access cheap, now that the film has been in stores for nearly two years. But no. Bel Ami acts as if the film is "still in theaters," and charges a pretty penny to see it in streaming video. Other major studios act the same way, charging an arm and a leg for releases (in some cases) nearly 30 years old. Indeed, studios act as if their very life's blood would be sucked dry if fans got their hands on product. Titan Media's approach has been to sue everyone (even fans) who put even the slightest bit of the studio's content online in any format whatsoever. Even the record companies and movie studios have largely abandoned that strategy.
Content unique to the Internet is almost unheard of. Some studios make a minimal effort to produce this content. Doing photographic layouts of models during a shoot (usually re-staging action from the film, and having a photographer in a back room shooting solo images) has been common since the mid-1980s. Prior to the rise of Net-porn, there was no incentive to produce much of this material. A studio only needed 20 or 30 photographs of Joe Blow. They'd trade these to a major gay porn magazine ("Inches," "Freshmen," "Advocate Men," "Blueboy," "Playguy," etc.) in exchange for two to four pages of advertising space for their films. The cost of producing this extra material was marginal, and obviated the need for marketing budgets. (This barter, by the way, constitutes 90 percent of the advertising business of most gay porn magazines. And you wonder why they are going bankrupt...)
But once studios opened member-only pages on their Web sites, they needed to fill that space with content. Gay porn studios quickly began taking not 20 or 30 photos for barter with a gay porn magazine but hundreds -- sometimes as many as 300 -- images. Again, the cost was marginal, since the photographer and model were already on the set. Instead of shooting 15 poses, the photographer now shot everything -- from the untying of the shoes to the bending over to remove socks to the odd facial expression. Digital photography helped, too: A photographer could produce thousands of images without the expense of developing the negative and making either chromes (e.g., slides; the nickname comes from the word Kodachrome, the most popular and highest-quality of slide film available) or prints.
But what, exactly, is this content? You know, if you put the images into a flip-book, you'd get a miniature animated movie. In fact, the number of poses, the number of costume changes, the number of settings, etc.: None of that has changed. What the viewer is getting is minutiae. Minor changes in pose, minor changes in dress, minor changes in erection strength. It's minor added value. But consumers, sadly, treat it as if they've just gotten 30 photosets instead of just one.
That's the "new" content which tends to populate the members-only section of most gay porn Web sites.
Some studios include outtakes (much as Sam Abdul's Forum Studios used to add to the end of his films) or edited footage as "new content" for these member-only sections. Somehow, studios believe this is really giving something to the consumer.
And marketing? Forget it.
The "New York Times Magazine" article points out that Kink.com's marketing staff is not only educated but innovative. Half the marketing team has an M.B.A. Among gay porn studios, you'll be hard pressed to find anyone with a college degree, much less a business degree. The degrees you will find are usually film-oriented. For example, John Rutherford over at Colt Studios has a film directing degree from UCLA. But that's all.
It's not uncommon for major gay porn studios to also have no accounting controls. One of the founders of a B-list gay porn studio was ousted recently after the new owners discovered he'd been embezzling company funds. Chi Chi LaRue has talked at length in his autobiography about the amount of cocaine he snorted. Do you think the funds for those drugs came from a trust fund? An inheritance? A McDonald's franchise he ran on the side? No: They came because LaRue paid himself a hefty salary for each film he did, and that salary was used to pay for drugs (not good porn). Indeed, it's standard gay porn industry practice for a studio to say to a director, "I'll pay you $50,000 to deliver a film." No studio (to my knowledge) every says, "I'll pay you $5,000 to deliver a film, and you spend $45,000 on sets, performers, editing, and so on." What usually occurs is that directors skimp on performer pay, sets, cinematography, editing, and more in order to pay themselves a fatter salary.
The challenge for directors is to turn in product which is passable -- not great, not superb, not fantastic. Just passable. Something that will sell moderately well, so that the studio will hire that director again.
In fact, gay porn is so full of high school dropouts, drug users, incompetents and the beneficiaries of nepotism that studios really pay for reliability, not great porn. They don't care if you are a coke-snorting alcoholic. Turn in a moderately well-selling film on time. That's all they want. You can hate porn and hate gay people, just turn in a moderately well-selling film on time. You can be the world's biggest drug addict, or pedophile, or murderer. Just turn in a moderately well-selling film on time. Reliability is the commodity most for sale in gay porn today, not good sex.
The article talks about how Kink.com has recruited networks of Web-affiliates to push traffic to Kink's sites. It is not uncommon for a popular site like Kink.com to have tens of thousands of affiliates. And gay porn? Let's take that hoary old "one in ten" assumption. If Kink.com has 10,000 affiliates, then Falcon should have 1,000. But, in fact, gay porn studios often have only a hundred or so. Indeed, Studio 2000 -- a gay porn studio which has sat on the border between A-list and B-list for more than a decade -- just started its first Web affiliate program in early 2007. Studio 2000 is so far behind the game in this regard that it had to offer 50 percent commission on all sales generated by a Web affiliate. Fifty percent! (There's no word on how affiliates can verify Studio 2000's sales. Studio 2000 hasn't agreed to open its books to affiliates or to an independent auditor so that sales can be verified and income distributed equitably.)
The article also talks about a number of other marketing strategies that Kink.com uses. Among these are strategically-placed ads on other Web sites or search engines, galleries of free samples, and in-person marketing efforts. But gay porn studios haven't even begun to place ads on popular gay sites like Gay.com, PlanetOut, TLA Video, or A Different Light Booksellers. The San Francisco-based weekly newspaper "Bay Area Reporter" has a weekly porn columnist, John Karr. But go to the Karr column's Web page, and you won't find a single ad for gay porn. Even the superb Gay Porn Times has only two Web ads -- and neither comes from a studio!
As for in-person marketing, you won't find it outside of Los Angeles. The most successful gay porn retailers engage in it. The terrific Rad Video, for example, routinely purchases booths at the major gay pride events across the country and sells thousands of dollars worth of films (as well as getting people on their ever-expanding mailing list). But you won't find a single gay adult film studio doing that. Rad Video makes so much money that they fly their own personnel across the country rather than relying on local contractors. You'd think that gay porn studios would at least advertise for some contractors to staff their booths. But no. In fact, gay porn studios only show up at the West Hollywood Gay Pride Parade and the Folsom Street Fair -- as if somehow West Hollywood and the hard-core leather community weren't aware of gay porn, and needed the marketing.
Gay porn studios have no other presence, either. You would think that a gay porn studio would advertise in a local community's gay pride program guide. No, they don't. You would think they might sponsor trash bins or banners or balloons or condom giveaways or safe sex brochures at gay pride events. No, they don't. You would think gay porn studios would donate a basket or two of free films to the various gay film festivals around the nation for those silent auctions. No, they don't. You would think gay porn studios might donate $1,000 a year to a local AIDS charity to print some brochures or distribute condoms. No, they don't. You'd think they might manufacture condoms or lube with their name on it, and give them free to major bars in various cities. No, they don't.
In other words, even when it comes to spreading the name of the gay porn studio in physical ways (not even with a warm body, much less a gay porn star), gay porn studios simply can't be bothered. That's marketing, and they don't market.
The article also speaks about the way Kink.com acts like a real business. Kink.com seeks the best personnel they can find. That doesn't mean they hire porn stars who fuck the boss. That would be Falcon, Channel One, Titan Media, and Bel Ami. No, Kink.com looks for the best personnel it can find, whether they are industry people or not. To find these individuals, Kink.com has employee benefits. Yes, employee benefits! That means health care, pension contributions, paid vacations, sick leave, a grievance procedure. You won't find that at any gay porn studio. Instead, gay porn studios argue that "we pay people so much, they should purchase this on their own." The problem is that gay porn doesn't pay well at all. Salaries for performers, for example, have not risen at all since the early 1990s. (They remain stuck at about $1,000 a film.) That's a pay cut of nearly 40 percent. Worse, you find that gay porn studios hire anyone who walks through the door. Chad Donovan, for example, has no college degree and no training. Yet, he has been director of production at three adult film studios. Why? Having a 9" penis, apparently. Chris Steele, who managed some gay bars in the Dallas area, is directing adult film for Falcon Studios despite having no background in film direction or production. His qualifications? He was a gay porn star. I guess because he knew how to order beer from a distributor, that qualified him to know a lot about lighting and cinematography.
You know, porn is always cited in the mainstream media as taking quick and aggressive advantage of new technology.
I guess that's true....so long as you are talking about straight porn.
The thing is, gay porn studios are dominated by men in their 50s and 60s who don't like technology, don't understand it, and don't see any reason why it should be used.
The thing is, gay porn studios are run on the barter system (by and large), and engage in the worst financial practices imaginable. The worst indulgences are permitted (inflated salaries to fund drug use, nepotism, insider hiring, abusive working environments).
The thing is, gay porn studios are run like little fiefdoms by the tin-star dictators who own them. They are not businesses, but self-indulgency factories. They are not innovators, but the most conservative of feudal kingdoms. They are not professionals, but amateurs playing at sex.
If you wonder why gay porn sucks, you need look no further.
"A Disciplined Business," by author Jon Mooallem, explores the legal, commercial, sexual and social impacts of BDSM pornography by looking at the history of Kink.com -- the largest and most successful site of its kind on the Internet.
Kink.com is notable because it is housed in the former San Francisco Armory, a major landmark in that city.
While there is much that is worthwhile in the article, I found this of particular interest:
It has long been noted that the San Fernando Valley is increasingly populated by strait-laced corporate managers and not by the oily, medallion-wearing men we once assumed. But succeeding on the Web, or simply surviving its escalating demands, has required more sophisticated entrepreneurial types. With the Internet pushing porn discreetly into the homes of conventional consumers, making it more a part of everyday life and less seedy-seeming, the industry has been better able than ever to attract that sort of employee. That is, as pornography becomes a more mainstream product, it becomes an equally mainstream career. (emphasis added)Consider just gay porn, I have to say that is utter nonsense.
The largest studios -- Falcon, Bel Ami, Titan Media and Channel One (new owner of All Worlds) -- struggle to deal with the Internet. Falcon, for example, can barely put streaming video online. It has a minimalist members-only section with little more than the odd photo and access to streaming video at a lower rate than the pay-per-view approach offered by its public pages. The other major studios have adopted approaches little different.
Few of the studios make it easy to access content online. Bel Ami spends about $75,000 on a film. Its duplicating costs are minimal, and it engages in almost no advertising or marketing. Bel Ami easily makes that budget back on American sales alone: "Lukas In Love" sold more than 2,500 copies at $60 a pop, netting $150,000 in gross revenues. It sold another 2,500 copies at retail (through retailers and to video stores), netting another $75,000 in gross revenues. You'd think the studio would make online access cheap, now that the film has been in stores for nearly two years. But no. Bel Ami acts as if the film is "still in theaters," and charges a pretty penny to see it in streaming video. Other major studios act the same way, charging an arm and a leg for releases (in some cases) nearly 30 years old. Indeed, studios act as if their very life's blood would be sucked dry if fans got their hands on product. Titan Media's approach has been to sue everyone (even fans) who put even the slightest bit of the studio's content online in any format whatsoever. Even the record companies and movie studios have largely abandoned that strategy.
Content unique to the Internet is almost unheard of. Some studios make a minimal effort to produce this content. Doing photographic layouts of models during a shoot (usually re-staging action from the film, and having a photographer in a back room shooting solo images) has been common since the mid-1980s. Prior to the rise of Net-porn, there was no incentive to produce much of this material. A studio only needed 20 or 30 photographs of Joe Blow. They'd trade these to a major gay porn magazine ("Inches," "Freshmen," "Advocate Men," "Blueboy," "Playguy," etc.) in exchange for two to four pages of advertising space for their films. The cost of producing this extra material was marginal, and obviated the need for marketing budgets. (This barter, by the way, constitutes 90 percent of the advertising business of most gay porn magazines. And you wonder why they are going bankrupt...)
But once studios opened member-only pages on their Web sites, they needed to fill that space with content. Gay porn studios quickly began taking not 20 or 30 photos for barter with a gay porn magazine but hundreds -- sometimes as many as 300 -- images. Again, the cost was marginal, since the photographer and model were already on the set. Instead of shooting 15 poses, the photographer now shot everything -- from the untying of the shoes to the bending over to remove socks to the odd facial expression. Digital photography helped, too: A photographer could produce thousands of images without the expense of developing the negative and making either chromes (e.g., slides; the nickname comes from the word Kodachrome, the most popular and highest-quality of slide film available) or prints.
But what, exactly, is this content? You know, if you put the images into a flip-book, you'd get a miniature animated movie. In fact, the number of poses, the number of costume changes, the number of settings, etc.: None of that has changed. What the viewer is getting is minutiae. Minor changes in pose, minor changes in dress, minor changes in erection strength. It's minor added value. But consumers, sadly, treat it as if they've just gotten 30 photosets instead of just one.
That's the "new" content which tends to populate the members-only section of most gay porn Web sites.
Some studios include outtakes (much as Sam Abdul's Forum Studios used to add to the end of his films) or edited footage as "new content" for these member-only sections. Somehow, studios believe this is really giving something to the consumer.
And marketing? Forget it.
The "New York Times Magazine" article points out that Kink.com's marketing staff is not only educated but innovative. Half the marketing team has an M.B.A. Among gay porn studios, you'll be hard pressed to find anyone with a college degree, much less a business degree. The degrees you will find are usually film-oriented. For example, John Rutherford over at Colt Studios has a film directing degree from UCLA. But that's all.
It's not uncommon for major gay porn studios to also have no accounting controls. One of the founders of a B-list gay porn studio was ousted recently after the new owners discovered he'd been embezzling company funds. Chi Chi LaRue has talked at length in his autobiography about the amount of cocaine he snorted. Do you think the funds for those drugs came from a trust fund? An inheritance? A McDonald's franchise he ran on the side? No: They came because LaRue paid himself a hefty salary for each film he did, and that salary was used to pay for drugs (not good porn). Indeed, it's standard gay porn industry practice for a studio to say to a director, "I'll pay you $50,000 to deliver a film." No studio (to my knowledge) every says, "I'll pay you $5,000 to deliver a film, and you spend $45,000 on sets, performers, editing, and so on." What usually occurs is that directors skimp on performer pay, sets, cinematography, editing, and more in order to pay themselves a fatter salary.
The challenge for directors is to turn in product which is passable -- not great, not superb, not fantastic. Just passable. Something that will sell moderately well, so that the studio will hire that director again.
In fact, gay porn is so full of high school dropouts, drug users, incompetents and the beneficiaries of nepotism that studios really pay for reliability, not great porn. They don't care if you are a coke-snorting alcoholic. Turn in a moderately well-selling film on time. That's all they want. You can hate porn and hate gay people, just turn in a moderately well-selling film on time. You can be the world's biggest drug addict, or pedophile, or murderer. Just turn in a moderately well-selling film on time. Reliability is the commodity most for sale in gay porn today, not good sex.
The article talks about how Kink.com has recruited networks of Web-affiliates to push traffic to Kink's sites. It is not uncommon for a popular site like Kink.com to have tens of thousands of affiliates. And gay porn? Let's take that hoary old "one in ten" assumption. If Kink.com has 10,000 affiliates, then Falcon should have 1,000. But, in fact, gay porn studios often have only a hundred or so. Indeed, Studio 2000 -- a gay porn studio which has sat on the border between A-list and B-list for more than a decade -- just started its first Web affiliate program in early 2007. Studio 2000 is so far behind the game in this regard that it had to offer 50 percent commission on all sales generated by a Web affiliate. Fifty percent! (There's no word on how affiliates can verify Studio 2000's sales. Studio 2000 hasn't agreed to open its books to affiliates or to an independent auditor so that sales can be verified and income distributed equitably.)
The article also talks about a number of other marketing strategies that Kink.com uses. Among these are strategically-placed ads on other Web sites or search engines, galleries of free samples, and in-person marketing efforts. But gay porn studios haven't even begun to place ads on popular gay sites like Gay.com, PlanetOut, TLA Video, or A Different Light Booksellers. The San Francisco-based weekly newspaper "Bay Area Reporter" has a weekly porn columnist, John Karr. But go to the Karr column's Web page, and you won't find a single ad for gay porn. Even the superb Gay Porn Times has only two Web ads -- and neither comes from a studio!
As for in-person marketing, you won't find it outside of Los Angeles. The most successful gay porn retailers engage in it. The terrific Rad Video, for example, routinely purchases booths at the major gay pride events across the country and sells thousands of dollars worth of films (as well as getting people on their ever-expanding mailing list). But you won't find a single gay adult film studio doing that. Rad Video makes so much money that they fly their own personnel across the country rather than relying on local contractors. You'd think that gay porn studios would at least advertise for some contractors to staff their booths. But no. In fact, gay porn studios only show up at the West Hollywood Gay Pride Parade and the Folsom Street Fair -- as if somehow West Hollywood and the hard-core leather community weren't aware of gay porn, and needed the marketing.
Gay porn studios have no other presence, either. You would think that a gay porn studio would advertise in a local community's gay pride program guide. No, they don't. You would think they might sponsor trash bins or banners or balloons or condom giveaways or safe sex brochures at gay pride events. No, they don't. You would think gay porn studios would donate a basket or two of free films to the various gay film festivals around the nation for those silent auctions. No, they don't. You would think gay porn studios might donate $1,000 a year to a local AIDS charity to print some brochures or distribute condoms. No, they don't. You'd think they might manufacture condoms or lube with their name on it, and give them free to major bars in various cities. No, they don't.
In other words, even when it comes to spreading the name of the gay porn studio in physical ways (not even with a warm body, much less a gay porn star), gay porn studios simply can't be bothered. That's marketing, and they don't market.
The article also speaks about the way Kink.com acts like a real business. Kink.com seeks the best personnel they can find. That doesn't mean they hire porn stars who fuck the boss. That would be Falcon, Channel One, Titan Media, and Bel Ami. No, Kink.com looks for the best personnel it can find, whether they are industry people or not. To find these individuals, Kink.com has employee benefits. Yes, employee benefits! That means health care, pension contributions, paid vacations, sick leave, a grievance procedure. You won't find that at any gay porn studio. Instead, gay porn studios argue that "we pay people so much, they should purchase this on their own." The problem is that gay porn doesn't pay well at all. Salaries for performers, for example, have not risen at all since the early 1990s. (They remain stuck at about $1,000 a film.) That's a pay cut of nearly 40 percent. Worse, you find that gay porn studios hire anyone who walks through the door. Chad Donovan, for example, has no college degree and no training. Yet, he has been director of production at three adult film studios. Why? Having a 9" penis, apparently. Chris Steele, who managed some gay bars in the Dallas area, is directing adult film for Falcon Studios despite having no background in film direction or production. His qualifications? He was a gay porn star. I guess because he knew how to order beer from a distributor, that qualified him to know a lot about lighting and cinematography.
You know, porn is always cited in the mainstream media as taking quick and aggressive advantage of new technology.
I guess that's true....so long as you are talking about straight porn.
The thing is, gay porn studios are dominated by men in their 50s and 60s who don't like technology, don't understand it, and don't see any reason why it should be used.
The thing is, gay porn studios are run on the barter system (by and large), and engage in the worst financial practices imaginable. The worst indulgences are permitted (inflated salaries to fund drug use, nepotism, insider hiring, abusive working environments).
The thing is, gay porn studios are run like little fiefdoms by the tin-star dictators who own them. They are not businesses, but self-indulgency factories. They are not innovators, but the most conservative of feudal kingdoms. They are not professionals, but amateurs playing at sex.
If you wonder why gay porn sucks, you need look no further.
# posted by Tim : 4/29/2007 01:52:00 PM
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Great essay, Tim. It reminds me of one instance where a guy (forget his name, but he was in his late-30s/early-40s, lived somewhere in the South) who ran a blog ended up going into porn, and the studio that he was working for made him give up the blog. He wasn't able to have any kind of online presence except for what was mediated by their mediocre website.
It seems to me that they would be better off if all their porn stars had their own blogs and were able to get people interested in their work. Their refusal to let this guy do that just spoke volumes to me about how some folks in the "industry" just don't get it.
It seems to me that they would be better off if all their porn stars had their own blogs and were able to get people interested in their work. Their refusal to let this guy do that just spoke volumes to me about how some folks in the "industry" just don't get it.
"a guy"?
Joseph, Atlanta produces more gay porn stars per capita than any other city in the world. :)
But this does not surprise me. I was told by a gay porn magazine editor once that the majority of interviews he gets are really written by directors and studio heads -- because the performers are too incoherent to give anything but monosyllabic answers. While there are some very, very bright and well-educated people doing gay porn, there are also a lot of dullards.
Then there is the story about the reviewer who put a very mild criticism about an A-list studio director in his review. The director went ape-shit, sent him 10 emails over the course of a day, started a behind-the-scenes email campaign against him, and refused to let any of the studio's exclusives be interviewed by the this man any more.
A week later, the same director was cooing and ego-stroking the reviewer because he had juicy negative gossip about a rival. And all the evil, nasty, hateful things of the prior week? "Oh, did you take me seriously about that? Oh, you should know me better than that!!"
Well, yes. Yes, we do know that type better than that. It's called "hypocritical liar."
Joseph, Atlanta produces more gay porn stars per capita than any other city in the world. :)
But this does not surprise me. I was told by a gay porn magazine editor once that the majority of interviews he gets are really written by directors and studio heads -- because the performers are too incoherent to give anything but monosyllabic answers. While there are some very, very bright and well-educated people doing gay porn, there are also a lot of dullards.
Then there is the story about the reviewer who put a very mild criticism about an A-list studio director in his review. The director went ape-shit, sent him 10 emails over the course of a day, started a behind-the-scenes email campaign against him, and refused to let any of the studio's exclusives be interviewed by the this man any more.
A week later, the same director was cooing and ego-stroking the reviewer because he had juicy negative gossip about a rival. And all the evil, nasty, hateful things of the prior week? "Oh, did you take me seriously about that? Oh, you should know me better than that!!"
Well, yes. Yes, we do know that type better than that. It's called "hypocritical liar."
Do tell, Chris. Instead of tossing out a one-liner, point out five errors in that essay.
Even better, because the fans who buy the gay adult film industry's product don't know shit from shit, please cite published sources. Because, after all, fans only know what they read and experience.
And in my experience, inside the industry and out of it, this is how gay porn works.
If you wish to carry on a dialogue, then do so. Don't pop in, leave a line, and never come back.
Even better, because the fans who buy the gay adult film industry's product don't know shit from shit, please cite published sources. Because, after all, fans only know what they read and experience.
And in my experience, inside the industry and out of it, this is how gay porn works.
If you wish to carry on a dialogue, then do so. Don't pop in, leave a line, and never come back.
The guy's porn name was "Cliff Rhodes" and when he started working at Titan, they made him give up the blog ("Wet Dreaming"). I think he lived in South Carolina, not Atlanta, but really never e-mailed/talked with him. A friend of mine knew him, though.
Someone forwarded me this entry a few days ago and asked me to comment on it. As someone who works in and knows quite a lot about the gay porn industry, I initially felt the need to point out the many, many factual errors.
But as I re-read it and realized how spiteful the overall tone was I figured, "What's the point?" Obviously, Tim, you have an ax to grind with the gay porn industry and you are just looking to spew some bile -- (certainly not "carry on a dialogue" as you later claim).
It's not worth my time, but the thought of people reading this and thinking some of your preposterous claims are actually true is the kind of thing that drives me crazy, so here I am, taking time out of my busy fucking day to point out as much of the bullshit I can, and hopefully shut you up about this topic.
1. YOUR LIE: "Falcon, for example, can barely put streaming video online. It has a minimalist members-only section with little more than the odd photo and access to streaming video at a lower rate than the pay-per-view approach offered by its public pages."
THE TRUTH: Falcon allows members to stream their last six months' of new releases at 512k. They post anywhere between 50-100 images per movie.
2. YOUR LIE: "Content unique to the Internet is almost unheard of. "
THE TRUTH: SeanCody.com, RandyBlue.com, Fratmen.com, ChaosMen.com, CorbinFisher.com are all examples of unique web-only content. Falcon posts one full-length sex scene a week that they produce exclusively for the web. They stream weekly live sex shows and each of their exclusives do live webcam shows for members only. ColtStudios also does frequent webcam shows with their exclusives, too.
3. YOUR LIE: "Among gay porn studios, you'll be hard pressed to find anyone with a college degree, much less a business degree. The degrees you will find are usually film-oriented."
THE TRUTH: Have you really asked EVERYONE in the gay porn industry if they went to college? I work for a porn studio and I'd be willing to bet money that I went to a better college then you did, Tim. I can't talk for everyone in the entire industry but lmost everyone in my office has a college degree. Chris Ward has a PhD in History.
4. YOUR LIE: "For example, John Rutherford over at Colt Studios has a film directing degree from UCLA. But that's all."
THE TRUTH: Rutherford graduated from San Francisco State University with a degree in Broadcast Communication Arts. (Source: http://johnrutherfordblog.blogspot.com/2006/03/who-am-i-this-is-from-my-official-bio.html)
5. YOUR LIE: "Chi LaRue has talked at length in his autobiography about the amount of cocaine he snorted. Do you think the funds for those drugs came from a trust fund? ... No: They came because LaRue paid himself a hefty salary for each film he did, and that salary was used to pay for drugs (not good porn)."
THE TRUTH: Chi Chi's autobiography was published in 1997. He didn't start Channel 1 until 1999; he was working freelance for a variety of studios. Freelance directors can't pay themselves hefty salaries.
6. YOUR LIE: "What usually occurs is that directors skimp on performer pay, sets, cinematography, editing, and more in order to pay themselves a fatter salary."
THE TRUTH: You appear to be conflating the role of a producer and a director. A director is hired by a studio and paid a flat rate. They are not in charge of paying for everything -- that is the role of the studio or the producer.
7. YOUR LIE: "In fact, gay porn is so full of high school dropouts, drug users, incompetents and the beneficiaries of nepotism that studios really pay for reliability, not great porn."
THE TRUTH: I encountered far more drug use when I worked in publishing. Also, could you clarify how nepotism could play in a role in an industry where few people have children?
8. YOUR LIE: "Studio 2000 is so far behind the game in this regard that it had to offer 50 percent commission on all sales generated by a Web affiliate.
THE TRUTH: 50% is the industry standard pay-out for affiliates. Falcon pays 40-50% based on volume. SeanCody, RandyBlue, Corbin Fisher, etc, all pay 50%.
9. YOUR LIE: "But gay porn studios haven't even begun to place ads on popular gay sites like Gay.com, PlanetOut, TLA Video, or A Different Light Booksellers."
THE TRUTH: PlanetOut doesn't allow adult advertisers. Gay.com has many adult advertisers, but they are kept behind a firewall in their "Men After Dark" adult section. TLA doesn't accept advertising. A Different Light's site ranks 246,000 on Alexa - which hardly makes them a "popular gay site".
10. YOUR LIE: "The guy's porn name was "Cliff Rhodes" and when he started working at Titan, they made him give up the blog ("Wet Dreaming").:
THE TRUTH: Cliff is a good friend of mine, and he confirms with me that this is blatantly untrue.
That's really just the tip of the iceberg. I could go on... but hopefully I've gotten my point across that this is utter bullshit.
Thanks for wasting my time, Tim!
-Jack
Editor, GayPornBlog
# posted by jack
But as I re-read it and realized how spiteful the overall tone was I figured, "What's the point?" Obviously, Tim, you have an ax to grind with the gay porn industry and you are just looking to spew some bile -- (certainly not "carry on a dialogue" as you later claim).
It's not worth my time, but the thought of people reading this and thinking some of your preposterous claims are actually true is the kind of thing that drives me crazy, so here I am, taking time out of my busy fucking day to point out as much of the bullshit I can, and hopefully shut you up about this topic.
1. YOUR LIE: "Falcon, for example, can barely put streaming video online. It has a minimalist members-only section with little more than the odd photo and access to streaming video at a lower rate than the pay-per-view approach offered by its public pages."
THE TRUTH: Falcon allows members to stream their last six months' of new releases at 512k. They post anywhere between 50-100 images per movie.
2. YOUR LIE: "Content unique to the Internet is almost unheard of. "
THE TRUTH: SeanCody.com, RandyBlue.com, Fratmen.com, ChaosMen.com, CorbinFisher.com are all examples of unique web-only content. Falcon posts one full-length sex scene a week that they produce exclusively for the web. They stream weekly live sex shows and each of their exclusives do live webcam shows for members only. ColtStudios also does frequent webcam shows with their exclusives, too.
3. YOUR LIE: "Among gay porn studios, you'll be hard pressed to find anyone with a college degree, much less a business degree. The degrees you will find are usually film-oriented."
THE TRUTH: Have you really asked EVERYONE in the gay porn industry if they went to college? I work for a porn studio and I'd be willing to bet money that I went to a better college then you did, Tim. I can't talk for everyone in the entire industry but lmost everyone in my office has a college degree. Chris Ward has a PhD in History.
4. YOUR LIE: "For example, John Rutherford over at Colt Studios has a film directing degree from UCLA. But that's all."
THE TRUTH: Rutherford graduated from San Francisco State University with a degree in Broadcast Communication Arts. (Source: http://johnrutherfordblog.blogspot.com/2006/03/who-am-i-this-is-from-my-official-bio.html)
5. YOUR LIE: "Chi LaRue has talked at length in his autobiography about the amount of cocaine he snorted. Do you think the funds for those drugs came from a trust fund? ... No: They came because LaRue paid himself a hefty salary for each film he did, and that salary was used to pay for drugs (not good porn)."
THE TRUTH: Chi Chi's autobiography was published in 1997. He didn't start Channel 1 until 1999; he was working freelance for a variety of studios. Freelance directors can't pay themselves hefty salaries.
6. YOUR LIE: "What usually occurs is that directors skimp on performer pay, sets, cinematography, editing, and more in order to pay themselves a fatter salary."
THE TRUTH: You appear to be conflating the role of a producer and a director. A director is hired by a studio and paid a flat rate. They are not in charge of paying for everything -- that is the role of the studio or the producer.
7. YOUR LIE: "In fact, gay porn is so full of high school dropouts, drug users, incompetents and the beneficiaries of nepotism that studios really pay for reliability, not great porn."
THE TRUTH: I encountered far more drug use when I worked in publishing. Also, could you clarify how nepotism could play in a role in an industry where few people have children?
8. YOUR LIE: "Studio 2000 is so far behind the game in this regard that it had to offer 50 percent commission on all sales generated by a Web affiliate.
THE TRUTH: 50% is the industry standard pay-out for affiliates. Falcon pays 40-50% based on volume. SeanCody, RandyBlue, Corbin Fisher, etc, all pay 50%.
9. YOUR LIE: "But gay porn studios haven't even begun to place ads on popular gay sites like Gay.com, PlanetOut, TLA Video, or A Different Light Booksellers."
THE TRUTH: PlanetOut doesn't allow adult advertisers. Gay.com has many adult advertisers, but they are kept behind a firewall in their "Men After Dark" adult section. TLA doesn't accept advertising. A Different Light's site ranks 246,000 on Alexa - which hardly makes them a "popular gay site".
10. YOUR LIE: "The guy's porn name was "Cliff Rhodes" and when he started working at Titan, they made him give up the blog ("Wet Dreaming").:
THE TRUTH: Cliff is a good friend of mine, and he confirms with me that this is blatantly untrue.
That's really just the tip of the iceberg. I could go on... but hopefully I've gotten my point across that this is utter bullshit.
Thanks for wasting my time, Tim!
-Jack
Editor, GayPornBlog
# posted by jack
You should seriously look into becoming a fiction writer. You're clearly an expert at it.
Jack Shamama already articulately pointed out your blatant lies and misinformation, so I won't bother reiterating his statements.
And, as someone who works at Kink.com, I can tell you that what we do in terms of marketing is pretty much industry standard. And in fact, because the content we provide is considered more "extreme" than most online porn, we have less of a marketing presence in certain arenas than our peers in the mainstream gay and straight porn worlds.
Why don't you do an ounce of research before you go posting tripe like this. And please do not play the angle of trying to start a "dialog" when your article is so inflammatory and attacking.
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Jack Shamama already articulately pointed out your blatant lies and misinformation, so I won't bother reiterating his statements.
And, as someone who works at Kink.com, I can tell you that what we do in terms of marketing is pretty much industry standard. And in fact, because the content we provide is considered more "extreme" than most online porn, we have less of a marketing presence in certain arenas than our peers in the mainstream gay and straight porn worlds.
Why don't you do an ounce of research before you go posting tripe like this. And please do not play the angle of trying to start a "dialog" when your article is so inflammatory and attacking.
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