4 ms·

Hurting For Cash, Online Porn Tries New Tricks

28 points by uladzislau 13y ago

hmsimha 13y ago
> Acworth says no one has to worry about personal data getting sold to outside advertisers. "I shouldn't think anyone would really be interested in that. Who would want to buy data pertaining to whether somebody likes bondage or spanking?" Hmm.. how about the same kinds of people who build websites that display mugshot information, but allow you to pay a fee to have yours removed.
- nwh 13y ago
  Porn habits on one side of the table, real name pulled from the credit card used to pay for it on the other. $50 and this all disappears from the internet!
ppThrowaway 13y ago
Appologies in advanced, I signed up for a throwaway for this commment as I'm just not there yet to where I would tie this to my actual account. I paid for porn from one of the largest sites, and immediatly had spam sent from my account until I changed my password. Yes, it was dumb of me to reuse passwords but that was my habit then, which has since changed. I also rarely received spam to that account, and immediatly started to get plenty of adult themed spam (and continue to). So, there is still sketchness in that corner of the internet. That being said, what online porn sites need to do, in my opinion, is offer single video downloads. Plenty of people don't care to sign up to a single site for $100 a year. Some want just one scene. Some want a handful by the performer. The producer in the linked article, Kink.com, already does this, but many of the large porn sites do not. I don't think they would even lose much business, as the type of people who are already paying monthly subscriptions would still be better served by them. edit: I'm not even sure if Kink.com does still do this? I looked on the site quickly and didn't see the option anymore. Don't feel like digging into it further at the moment.
bambax 13y ago
> We're suffering what happened to the music industry a while back Not really. Songs or artists are not perfect substitutes to one another; if you want to listen to a specific song from a specific artist, you'll be looking for that song and in most cases another song won't do. Therefore, if it was possible to make this song absolutely unavailable via illegal means, you'd have a very strong incentive to buy it. Porn videos are mostly perfect substitutes to one another (in their respective broad specialty; a gay sex video isn't a substitute to a straight sex video, but a nurse video is a substitute to a teacher-student one). Therefore, in order to make people pay for porn, the porn industry would have to make all free porn videos disappear, which is impossible. It would seem they're in much direr straits than the music industry.
- YokoZar 13y ago
  Don't be so sure. Some porn stars are brands unto themselves, and go on stripping tours not dissimilar from musician's concerts. Perhaps it's only a matter of time till we see pornography crowdfunding.
  - rickenharp 13y ago
    Pornography crowdfunding already exists: http://offbeatr.com/ http://offbeatr.com/
    - bambax 13y ago
      Excellent! The logo is a little reminiscent of Ted (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1637725/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1637725/), is this on purpose? Their fees are sky-high (30% of money collected) and the FAQ is not written in very good English, so I'd be rather weary of using them, but the idea is great!
beloch 13y ago
Porn has long been at the forefront of internet technology, driving next-gen solutions that eventually trickle down to many other sectors. However, when faced with declining sales due to privacy fears, Kink (and many other sites) are shrugging off privacy concerns in order to make a buck off of invasive advertising ("Honey, why am I seeing so many ads for condoms and nipple clamps today?"). Talk about self-destructive business practices! North American society is far too prudish about sex; especially sex that isn't deemed "mainstream". BDSM themes in particular have long been used by Hollywood to characterize particularly vile antagonists. Mainstream sexual mores are becoming less parochial, but not nearly fast enough to alleviate privacy concerns for most people. Acworth really ought to take this a lot more seriously. His attitude ranks up there with the Sony exec's who figured rootkits were a good idea! It really is a recipe for disaster when pirated goods carry fewer risks than legitimately purchased goods!
- broolstoryco 13y ago
  >when faced with declining sales due to privacy fears thats where bitcoin comes in
  - drcross 13y ago
    yep. Microtransactions built into the browser would herald a paradigm shift. I wouldnt pay 20 dollars per month for a recurring porn subscription but I would pay 70 cents to watch a single video every once in a while.
  - sickpig 13y ago
    or cryptocurrency in general as soon as porn industries will start to accept doge/lite/max/whatever coin
  - saurik 13y ago
    To verify, you mean by ruining any idea of privacy by making all transactions public? (It isn't clear if you are actually saying that bitcoin would increase the privacy experienced in this situation.)
awalton 13y ago
Given where we are (hacker news) I'm astounded the first response to this article wasn't "Use bitcoins!" since that's exactly the type of thing that it is best at. Then all you need to do is start explaining bitcoin to your significant other just long enough for their eyes to go glassy, begging you to stop.
- lightcatcher 13y ago
  Paying for porn with bitcoin puts all of your porn purchases on a public ledger. I don't think too many people want that.
  - awalton 13y ago
    Let's be serious here, laundering a bitcoin is as easy as trading it at an exchange for another one. Getting a wallet is as easy as generating a new one. There's no permanent record that person X had bitcoin Y, just which wallets it passed through along the way. If your significant other works for a Three Letter Agency, then maybe it's possible they could reverse the network connection logs to the exchanges, dig through their databases and prove that you were the one who owned the coin that bought that porn. Maybe. But given how little the FBI has done with the cache of bitcash they seized, I doubt it. So admittedly, it's not as clean as a cash business... but neither is the sex industry.
    - hmsimha 13y ago
      All true, but who needs to launder bitcoin to keep a transaction hidden from their significant other, unless their SO is well-versed in the technology behind bitcoin AND really likes to snoop. In that case, an easier and more likely point of failure is a session logger/keylogger on one's porn-browsing device
  - jrockway 13y ago
    The source address is public, but who owns the source address is only as public as you want it to be.
  - sireat 13y ago
easy_rider 13y ago
Also people who actually end up paying for porn, will end up seeing the same stuff they can watch for free. The big porn clips get their watermarks removed, chopped up, re-watermarked, and spammed on tube sites to compete with all other parties who are doing the exact same thing: Rip, re-watermark, re-distribute. No one can really complain, because everyone is doing the same.. Sure you could buy some "unique content" from time to time. Costs around $750 a video, shipped from Prague, Czech Republic. But there's not much value in that, because other people will just rip, re-watermark, re-distribute :)

28 points by uladzislau 13y ago

> Acworth says no one has to worry about personal data getting sold to outside advertisers. "I shouldn't think anyone would really be interested in that. Who would want to buy data pertaining to whether somebody likes bondage or spanking?" Hmm.. how about the same kinds of people who build websites that display mugshot information, but allow you to pay a fee to have yours removed.

nwh 13y ago
Porn habits on one side of the table, real name pulled from the credit card used to pay for it on the other. $50 and this all disappears from the internet!

ppThrowaway 13y ago

Appologies in advanced, I signed up for a throwaway for this commment as I'm just not there yet to where I would tie this to my actual account. I paid for porn from one of the largest sites, and immediatly had spam sent from my account until I changed my password. Yes, it was dumb of me to reuse passwords but that was my habit then, which has since changed. I also rarely received spam to that account, and immediatly started to get plenty of adult themed spam (and continue to). So, there is still sketchness in that corner of the internet. That being said, what online porn sites need to do, in my opinion, is offer single video downloads. Plenty of people don't care to sign up to a single site for $100 a year. Some want just one scene. Some want a handful by the performer. The producer in the linked article, Kink.com, already does this, but many of the large porn sites do not. I don't think they would even lose much business, as the type of people who are already paying monthly subscriptions would still be better served by them. edit: I'm not even sure if Kink.com does still do this? I looked on the site quickly and didn't see the option anymore. Don't feel like digging into it further at the moment.

bambax 13y ago

> We're suffering what happened to the music industry a while back Not really. Songs or artists are not perfect substitutes to one another; if you want to listen to a specific song from a specific artist, you'll be looking for that song and in most cases another song won't do. Therefore, if it was possible to make this song absolutely unavailable via illegal means, you'd have a very strong incentive to buy it. Porn videos are mostly perfect substitutes to one another (in their respective broad specialty; a gay sex video isn't a substitute to a straight sex video, but a nurse video is a substitute to a teacher-student one). Therefore, in order to make people pay for porn, the porn industry would have to make all free porn videos disappear, which is impossible. It would seem they're in much direr straits than the music industry.

YokoZar 13y ago
Don't be so sure. Some porn stars are brands unto themselves, and go on stripping tours not dissimilar from musician's concerts. Perhaps it's only a matter of time till we see pornography crowdfunding.
- rickenharp 13y ago
  Pornography crowdfunding already exists: http://offbeatr.com/ http://offbeatr.com/
  - bambax 13y ago
    Excellent! The logo is a little reminiscent of Ted (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1637725/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1637725/), is this on purpose? Their fees are sky-high (30% of money collected) and the FAQ is not written in very good English, so I'd be rather weary of using them, but the idea is great!

beloch 13y ago

Porn has long been at the forefront of internet technology, driving next-gen solutions that eventually trickle down to many other sectors. However, when faced with declining sales due to privacy fears, Kink (and many other sites) are shrugging off privacy concerns in order to make a buck off of invasive advertising ("Honey, why am I seeing so many ads for condoms and nipple clamps today?"). Talk about self-destructive business practices! North American society is far too prudish about sex; especially sex that isn't deemed "mainstream". BDSM themes in particular have long been used by Hollywood to characterize particularly vile antagonists. Mainstream sexual mores are becoming less parochial, but not nearly fast enough to alleviate privacy concerns for most people. Acworth really ought to take this a lot more seriously. His attitude ranks up there with the Sony exec's who figured rootkits were a good idea! It really is a recipe for disaster when pirated goods carry fewer risks than legitimately purchased goods!

broolstoryco 13y ago
>when faced with declining sales due to privacy fears thats where bitcoin comes in
- drcross 13y ago
  yep. Microtransactions built into the browser would herald a paradigm shift. I wouldnt pay 20 dollars per month for a recurring porn subscription but I would pay 70 cents to watch a single video every once in a while.
- sickpig 13y ago
  or cryptocurrency in general as soon as porn industries will start to accept doge/lite/max/whatever coin
- saurik 13y ago
  To verify, you mean by ruining any idea of privacy by making all transactions public? (It isn't clear if you are actually saying that bitcoin would increase the privacy experienced in this situation.)

awalton 13y ago

Given where we are (hacker news) I'm astounded the first response to this article wasn't "Use bitcoins!" since that's exactly the type of thing that it is best at. Then all you need to do is start explaining bitcoin to your significant other just long enough for their eyes to go glassy, begging you to stop.

lightcatcher 13y ago
Paying for porn with bitcoin puts all of your porn purchases on a public ledger. I don't think too many people want that.
- awalton 13y ago
  Let's be serious here, laundering a bitcoin is as easy as trading it at an exchange for another one. Getting a wallet is as easy as generating a new one. There's no permanent record that person X had bitcoin Y, just which wallets it passed through along the way. If your significant other works for a Three Letter Agency, then maybe it's possible they could reverse the network connection logs to the exchanges, dig through their databases and prove that you were the one who owned the coin that bought that porn. Maybe. But given how little the FBI has done with the cache of bitcash they seized, I doubt it. So admittedly, it's not as clean as a cash business... but neither is the sex industry.
  - hmsimha 13y ago
    All true, but who needs to launder bitcoin to keep a transaction hidden from their significant other, unless their SO is well-versed in the technology behind bitcoin AND really likes to snoop. In that case, an easier and more likely point of failure is a session logger/keylogger on one's porn-browsing device
- jrockway 13y ago
  The source address is public, but who owns the source address is only as public as you want it to be.
- sireat 13y ago

easy_rider 13y ago

Also people who actually end up paying for porn, will end up seeing the same stuff they can watch for free. The big porn clips get their watermarks removed, chopped up, re-watermarked, and spammed on tube sites to compete with all other parties who are doing the exact same thing: Rip, re-watermark, re-distribute. No one can really complain, because everyone is doing the same.. Sure you could buy some "unique content" from time to time. Costs around $750 a video, shipped from Prague, Czech Republic. But there's not much value in that, because other people will just rip, re-watermark, re-distribute :)