With the slowing economy and with our financial futures looking gloomy, today’s consumers are searching for value in everything, including porn.  Customers want the most bang for their buck, no pun intended.  For their monthly subscription fee they would like to get as much content as they can handle.  But as you will quickly see quantity shouldn’t be at the top of the list.

You may wonder why I chose pay site business models rather than free sites.  The answer is very simple.  The recent explosion of free “tube” sites is a scourge to the online adult world.  The internet surfer can go on these sites and watch free porn to his heart’s content.  However the content is almost always stolen material (as in copyright infringement).  Many tube site owners become members of a pay site and then download all of the material (called a “site rip”) and offer it to their surfers for free.  It is a plague that has devastated the adult internet industry.  Sales have declined sharply and many sites have disappeared.  Many may follow suit.  So what will happen when tube sites have taken over the industry?  There will be no more new porn to watch as fresh content will not be produced.  As you can see something must give.   But that is another topic.  Let us focus on the matter at hand.

Quantity is important but it shouldn’t rank at the top.  A site that has only 10 videos available may not be keeping their customers for too long. One must consider this, what is the quality of the 10 videos?  Are they mediocre?  Are they boring?  Are they the run of the mill, standard movies?  Or are they exciting and incredibly erotic?  While 10 videos are a bit lacking you can pose this question: if those same 10 videos absolutely blew your mind would your opinion change?  Hopefully so.  Great quality comes at a price.  So much time and effort went into the production of those videos for your ultimate enjoyment.  That shows that the webmaster cared enough to present you only the best material.  It shows his or her commitment to your satisfaction.  It also shows that they would like to keep you as a customer.

I am big on being different.  Both as a person and as an adult pay site.  Why blend in with the crowd when you can stand out and make an impact?  That is something that I strive to give and something that you should also look at when visiting a prospective pay site.  Being different can take on many meanings in the adult world.  For one the web site should look different.  A cookie-cutter site turns me away.  A cookie-cutter site meaning that it looks almost exactly the same as other sites.  From the design to the overall feel.  One wants a site that can stand away from the rest.  Another way to be different is to feature model/models that have different body types.  Not every female has 38DD breasts and have a humongous ass.  It is true that these features may turn you on but a little variety is always nice.  Different features may include smaller breasts, different ethnicities, or skinnier/larger women to name a few.

Another feature that adds to uniqueness is the inclusion of a specialty, or niche.  Specializing in something other than straight sex can include facials, foot worship, ATM, etc.  For more information on these and other niches, please see our article titled “Porn for Dummies- An online dictionary- The Niches”.  Since there are so many different niches out there, there are countless different possibilities for your total entertainment. 

Still another qualifying factor for having a good pay site is ease of use.  I am not terribly big on this feature but nevertheless it is important.  A site doesn’t have to be setup with fancy navigation buttons and links.  However at its most basic it should be easy to navigate through.  This is one of the first things that a webmaster should look at before he publishes his/her site.  There can be nothing more frustrating to a paying customer than being lost inside the site.  A confusing or difficult to navigate site will almost definitely have unhappy customers that will not renew their memberships.

I am pretty big on innovativeness.  Is the web site bringing you the content in a fresh new way?  Are they presenting their content in a manner that you haven’t seen before?  This is a plus for the consumer.  How can a web site possibly bring the same old content in a new light?  All the webmaster has to do is put his thinking cap on and brainstorm for ideas.  Many ideas are easily overlooked because they seem too simple.  Sometimes simple can be better.

Some folks prefer to have interactivity.  Webcams and blogs are ways to interact with the members.  However a lot of web sites may not have the time or the resources to include such details.  If the site has such features then it is a definitely a plus for the consumer.  However exclusion of such services doesn’t mean that the web site is lacking.  They can more than make this up with other features instead.

Ahh. Price.  Nowadays it seems that price is everything.  The lower the price the better it is, right?  Not so fast.  While everyone would like to get the most they can for the least bit of money, we must remember the old adage: You get what you pay for.  While paying more monthly for an adult site does not guarantee better content, a rock bottom price will make you wonder why they are selling their material so cheap.  However I feel that if the quality is that good, people will pay a little more.  I have personally seen some photos of models recently that made my jaw drop.  They were so erotic and sexy that I really would pay a little more to see a little more.  In a nutshell, you will pay for quality.  And in the end we are really talking less than a dollar per day (generally).

High on the list of must-have features is the updates factor.  While most sites update once a week, some update less frequently.  Some may update once a day!  It varies from site to site.  But if a site chooses to update once every few months then they are in trouble right off the bat.  I can see if a site has thousands of pictures and thousands of movies in their library.  They can afford to skip a week or two.  But for a startup site that would be suicide.  If a member can view and download all of your videos (for their own personal entertainment) in a day then generally they are in trouble.  Don’t get me wrong.  Some start up sites may not have a whole heap of content.  They begin with limited media available.  If they are updating frequently and trying to put out quality material then they are showing the consumer that they are doing their best.  Pretty soon their archives will have enough content to satisfy all.

Probably number one on this list is exclusivity.  Why would anyone want to see porn that is featured on every other site?  Media like this is a dime a dozen and really is watered down porn.  You want porn that you can’t see anywhere else.  That’s the trick.  Producing unique and exclusive content is what makes members stay around.  If you can’t get it from tube sites and torrent sites then where can you go to see this hot performer?  Only at the site!  Keeping the content exclusive is another topic, as webmasters must get aggressive with ISP’s and the proper authorities with regards to copyright infringement.  These are very serious charges and can mean jail time and hefty fines for the offenders.  As material is stolen and starts to get around the site starts to lose money.  Pretty soon the site may go out of business and this hot performer that turned you on will no longer be available.  Do the right thing, don’t support tube sites!

Ease of cancellation is also important.  Who wants to stay a member much less return as a member if the cancellation process is extremely difficult?  No one wants a hassle if they choose to cancel a membership.  An easy way to cancel will make the customer feel at ease if they choose to come back another day. In our next blog post we will continue to look at the factors that make a pay site a good choice.  Stay tuned.

Having been born and raised in a big city (New York) I have been exposed to the sea of yellow taxi cabs that inundate the city.  For those that have never seen or experienced such a sight I will try to explain a little.  Yellow cab drivers are probably the most aggressive drivers outside of NASCAR in the world, I think.  They will cut you off in a heartbeat and will drive erratically in order to get to their next fare.  So nothing was out of the ordinary as I took a little stroll recently.  I was in a thoughtful, daydream-like state when I suddenly glanced over and saw one of the aforementioned infamous yellow taxi cabs.  However it wasn’t the crazy, kamikaze-like style driving that caught my attention.  It wasn’t the cursing of other drivers that caught my ear.  It was the advertisement that was on top of the taxi cab that grabbed my focus.

Advertisement s on top of cabs are nothing new, they have been around for years.  While the technology has changed (print vs. plasma) the underlying purpose is the same.  But this time I felt a strong connection to the ad, an almost immediate one.  It was an advertisement for a gentlemen’s club in the city.  It was a pretty ordinary ad as it only stated the establishment’s name and the fact that it was a gentlemen’s club.  But why would I have a strong feeling against this ad?  Why would I even bother to write an article based on an ad that was on top of a taxi? 

Quite simply, I was appalled that the government, both federal and city, do everything in their power to restrict online adult businesses.  They try to censor or ban as much as they can.  So many religious groups battle non-stop to put an end to anything even vaguely reminiscent of pornography.  In the US many adult webmasters have been arrested and put on trial on obscenity charges.  They want to make an example of anyone running an adult business and want to destroy people’s freedoms in being able to view adult materials if they wish to do so.  These groups claim that it is unrighteous and they want to protect the children.  Meanwhile the church, as the #1 anti-adult faction, has had its share of porn problems.  Priests, ministers and so-called leaders have all fallen victim to the very thing that they have been preaching against, pornography and prostitution to name a few. 

But here is a “gentlemen’s club” freely advertising on a cab that will be seen by hundreds if not thousands.  How many of those will be children?  How many of those people viewed that ad willingly?  How many will be offended by that advertisement?  Not too many.  In fact I am pretty sure that no one will ever make a complaint.  They will just look away.  And for those that are truly interested, they will visit this gentlemen’s club.

All of these politicians and all of these anti-porn groups are going after one thing yet they turn their heads away for something that is so very similar.  Granted porn sites usually feature hardcore performances, but gentlemen’s clubs, or strip clubs as we know them, can be just as bad.  For a fee you can have a lovely lady dance on your lap.  For a few dollars you can thank a beautiful lady for showing you her goods.  And for a few more you can go into the VIP room with her.  Hmmm.

So perhaps strip clubs and adult sites are different branches of the same tree.  We are similar but slightly different.  Well how come these extremist, holier-than-thou groups do not persecute such ads?  What’s good for one is good for the other.  Perhaps I should advertise our website on a yellow cab, but change the text a little.  How about, www.samssexsite.com  A Gentlemen’s Site.  Or maybe www.samssexblog.com  A Gentlemen’s Blog.  That way we would be exempt from harassment. 

I am not against strip clubs in any way whatsoever.  I feel that if you wish to go to an adult spot and see naked women or men and you are an adult then by all means you have the right to go.  No one should be punishing you or trying to take away your right to do so.  Likewise with all adult sites.  If you are above the legal age of consent (18 in the US) and you wish to visit an adult-oriented site and view pornographic material then by all means go ahead.  As long as you got there willingly and as long as everything was done to protect minors from viewing the materials.  The morality groups should have no say on what choice YOU make.  I wonder if we were to confiscate their computers and take a look inside.  What websites have THEY been visiting?

Election Day for the United States is finally upon us.  After what seems like years of campaigning, we are finally at the cusp of a new presidential era.  Both parties are exhausted from their bitter battles.  But even more exhausted are the voters themselves.  With all the change that has been promised by both candidates one cannot help but speculate what kind of changes they have in mind.  While the economy and the Middle Eastern crisis are at the top of the list I wonder if pornography is also on the agenda.  More specifically obscenity.

Recent headlines regarding a mass crackdown on internet pornography and obscenity leads me to believe that the current trend may last a lot longer that we may have thought.  While both candidates have not stated what stance they take on obscenity we can be sure that their views will be very loud and clear once they win the election.  But why should anyone care what political views the presidential candidates have on the issue of obscenity?  Their positions may mean that sweeping changes may come upon the adult internet community worldwide.

With more FBI crackdowns come less websites and with less websites come less overall adult entertainment for web surfers.  Perhaps change is good for an over-saturated market one may think.  But drastic changes will mean an end to the way that adult webmasters market their products.  Many will change with the times and adopt new business models.  Many, however, will not or cannot change and will be forced out of business.  These turn of events will not only affect the United States but its effects will be felt worldwide.  Many countries have their own obscenity laws and cannot host their own adult content on their ISP’s (Australia for example).  By limiting our freedoms many countries, such as Australia who host their adult sites in the USA, will lose their websites.  This effect will snowball and what started out as a obscenity crackdown in the US will change the way that people look at porn on a worldwide scale.

I believe that there are bigger fish to catch.  I feel that the FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigations) is mis-prioritizing.  Their resources should be expended on more pressing concerns.  While obscenity laws are designed to protect children and non-consenting adults they are too vague.  The laws were written long ago before there was such a thing known as the internet.  Times have changed and we as a society have grown technologically.  Outlines must be made and lines must be drawn.  They could make laws that would protect “regular” sex and forbid “extreme” acts.  But then again, what is extreme or obscene? 

That’s right; it’s a matter of who is judging.  What is obscene to a churchgoer may not be obscene to the average web surfer.  What may offend your local politician may not offend his wife.  So how can there be laws to restrict obscenity?  One can argue that the law states for something to be obscene you must apply contemporary community standards, and taken as whole must appeal to the prurient (sick, morbid or shameless) interest.  So what community do they have in mind?  The community you live in?  Or could it be the internet community?  Or perhaps the church community?  And once again, what can be considered sick, morbid or shameless?  No doubt that one must draw the line somewhere.  There has to be a breaking point.  But who are we to decide where the line is drawn.  We can’t poll the entire human population and come up with figures.  Even if we could there would be too many different views on the subject.  So we are back at square one.

I am all for protecting children.  However I feel that it is the parent’s main responsibility to protect their children whenever they can by installing internet content filtering software.  If adults choose not to view porn then good for them.  They should not be unwillingly exposed to adult material.  However if they choose to view porn then it is their right.  As long as they are not violating anyone else’s rights then they should be fine.

In conclusion an outline should be drawn, a rough sketch if you will, on what is obscene.  Anything that is illegal is a good start.  From there you can expand.  By trial and error I am sure that you can find a somewhat happy medium.  Granted you will not be able to please everyone but it’s a start.  At least you have a solid foundation to work with.