how does the porn industry make money?

Kikin

Just something I've been thinking about recently, I've never in my life paid for porn, and don't know anyone who has (I'm male, in mid 30s )

Why would anyone pay for porn when there's such a colossal amount of it available for free, and the sites are hardly making money from advertising contracts I mean not many business or companies would want their name associated with a porn site.

It's obviously a huge industry with a lot of costs (Actors, actresses, models, photography equipment, web hosting, etc ) but where does the funding come from mainly?

Cycling Dumbasses

Kikin wrote: »

Just something I've been thinking about recently, I've never in my life paid for porn, and don't know anyone who has (I'm male, in mid 30s )

Why would anyone pay for porn when there's such a colossal amount of it available for free, and the sites are hardly making money from advertising contracts I mean not many business or companies would want their name associated with a porn site.

It's obviously a huge industry with a lot of costs (Actors, actresses, models, photography equipment, web hosting, etc ) but where does the funding come from mainly?

Go to Sleep

Kikin

Cycling Dumbasses wrote: »

Go to Sleep

That's actually not a bad idea, night all!

BeerWolf

A lot of the free porn are just amateur stuff, with nonexistent production costs... other than the camera.

"Professionally done" porn is what people pay.


This is just my guessing though.

Ken.

It was reported recently that most porn sites make loads of cash from adverts on their sites.

DEFTLEFTHAND

They're still people who will pay I suppose, think of how big the market actually is. It was massive business in the 90s in LA for instance ,Louis Theroux did a follow up doc to his first programme recently and it showed how the landscape of the industry has changed in the intervening years but theres still money to be made out there.

Rabelais

By exploiting young women to carry out increasingly sordid and depraved acts so men might inadvertently click on adverts.

hedzball

Scat is where its at!

Untouchable Peasant

Well, RoccoSiffredi.com, Woodmancastingx.com, Bangbros and EvilAngel would be the big four in porn circles and I'd say they do just fine with their subscriptions. You would rarely see their stuff on the tube sites and if you did, they would never be up that long.

Then their are the Netflix type ppv sites like Videobox etc which too bring in a mint.

New piracy laws are coming in soon which will give porn producers a fast way to find if their content has been uploaded anywhere online. I can't find the article now but read it a few weeks back and it was basically saying that the tube sites will soon just be all amateur content as the risk for those allowing the uploading of copyright content will be very high.

I doubt though that it will stop the Russian based tube sites. Can't see how it could anyway.

Megaupload, filesonic, Oron and a bunch of others have been taken down though:

FileSonic, Oron and Their Users Hit With Piracy Lawsuit

FileSonic and Oron, two prominent file-hosting services, have been dragged to court by adult entertainment company Flava Works. In a complaint filed at a federal court in Illinois, the cyberlockers are joined by 26 John Doe defendants who stand accused of sharing copyrighted material. These files were also allegedly shared on several other cyberlockers including FileServe, Hotfile and RapidShare.

After targeting hundreds of thousands of BitTorrent users, adult entertainment companies have recently expanded their legal efforts to file-hosting sites and their users.

Flava Works, known for winning a preliminary injunction (currently under appeal) in its landmark lawsuit against MyVidster, a case which involved Google, Facebook and even the MPAA, is now targeting two prominent file-hosting services and 26 of their users.

In papers filed at the District Court for the Northern District of Illinois last week, the company accuses FileSonic and Oron of several copyright related offenses.

Among other things, the complaint alleges that FileSonic and Oron are “websites that copy, store, distribute, display, profit from unauthorized copyrighted materials, and/or induce and assist others to infringe copyrighted materials.”

The two cyberlockers are joined by 26 John Doe defendants who allegedly shared links to copyrighted material with each other via several Yahoo groups. It is claimed that through these mailing lists the defendants actively traded links, some of which were uploaded by the defendants themselves.

oronAccording to Flava Works the file-hosting sites directly profited from these infringements through their affiliate programs.

The complaint characterizes FileSonic as an “illegitimate” outfit, a description repeated for Oron.

“On information and belief, at all relevant times, Filesonic.com is not a legitimate file storage company. Filesonic.com’s affiliates reward program offered members the opportunity to make money by uploading copyrighted videos.”

“Affiliates members are paid based upon the number of downloads of their posted materials and based upon how many other premium memberships were bought by users accessing Filesonic.com through the member’s links.”

Flava Works goes on to accuse FileSonic, Oron and the Doe defendants on several counts including direct copyright infringement, contributory copyright infringement and inducement of copyright infringement.

The adult company asks for a permanent injunction and temporary restraining order against the defendants. Flava Works further requests statutory, compensatory and punitive damages for the alleged infringements.

It is unclear why Flava Works has singled out these two file-hosting services as the complaint also mentions that Hotfile, Fileserve and Rapidshare were used to share files. Filesonic in particular seems to be an odd choice since the cyberlocker disabled public file-sharing months ago, which led to an exodus of users.

For Oron, this is the second lawsuit brought against the site this summer. Last month adult studio Corbin Fisher sued the company for no less than $34.8 million for alleged copyright infringements. As part of a settlement, Oron then offered to assist the studio prosecute its own users.

Both Oron and FileSonic have yet to respond to the complaint.

Here's another article on the industry and how it makes money also:

Porn Industry In Decline: Insiders Adapt To Piracy, Waning DVD Sales (NSFW)

LAS VEGAS -- Walking around the Adult Entertainment Expo (AEE) in Las Vegas, you'd never know the porn industry was at half-mast, sales-wise.

There are floor-to-ceiling billboards of scantily clad sex actresses and HD TV screens showing every conceivable type of fornication (and a few unconceivable ones as well). Fans can take pictures with stars like Lisa Ann (the porn version of Sarah Palin), Julia Ann (no relation) and Alexis Texas (formerly Alexis Texass). If polite enough, the fanboy or frangirl might even get to touch a breast.

If the AEE was one's only exposure to the industry, the crowded convention hall might seem proof that porn is truly recession-proof. But insiders claim the business has gone limp -- metaphorically speaking -- because more people are watching porn for free over the Internet instead of purchasing it.

The end result means fewer gigs for hard-working porn performers like Dave Cummings, a 72-year-old porn actor who has also produced three series: "Dirty Dave's Sugar Daddy," "Sex Fun" and "Kneepad Nymphos."

"The piracy has killed the industry," Cummings told HuffPost. "I'd say 80 percent of the companies that were around five years ago either don't exist or are hanging by a thread. The day a new video comes out, within 24 hours, someone has set up a tripod in front of their TV to copy it and then uploaded it illegally."

Cummings is staying home in San Diego this year, and feels the piracy has forced him into a premature retirement. "I'm not able to cover production costs, so why do it?" he said. "Companies that are still in business are either paying less in salary or having McDonalds do the catering instead of craft services."

Nate Glass, who runs TakeDownPiracy, an organization battling online porn copyright infringement, estimates DVD sales have dropped by 50 percent since 2007.

"A mid-level company that might have earned $350,000 a month in DVD sales before that was earning maybe $150,000 to $200,000 when the recession hit," Glass said. "That may have partly been due to the recession, but there hasn't been a bounceback like in other industries."

It's hard to track how much money the porn industry has lost, because it's nearly impossible to figure how much it typically earns. Theo Sapoutzis, the CEO and Chairman of Adult Video News (AVN), a trade journal that covers the porn industry and organizes the AEE, estimates that the pornography business made $10 billion in 2012, but admits getting exact figures is close to impossible since many porn companies are privately owned and tend to "inflate" their figures.

Sapoutzis "guesstimates" the industry made as much as $13 to $15 billion during its peak in the mid-2000s, before the recession. He accepts Cummings' suggestion that 80 percent of porn companies are now defunct or struggling, but Sapoutzis sees that as a sign that the porn business is maturing, not dying.

"There are more performers than ever before, but they're working as cam girls at home interacting with people, rather than in a studio," he said. "From a company standpoint, there's bigger competition. It's more difficult to enter."

Darren Roberts, who was the CEO of AVN between 1996 and 2010, said the last few years have been rough on sales of filmed fornication, but it's hard to know how much the companies are struggling.

"The companies are tightly held, so you have to take what they say with a grain of salt," he told HuffPost. "Otherwise, you can check sales at the retail level, the distributors or even the printer to see how many box covers were printed. But, even then, everyone refutes the figures anyway."

"The only thing for sure is video sales," said Roberts, who is also the author of The Unsexpected Story, a new book about the porn industry. "Sometimes, you can check which films did well on hotel cable systems because those are publicly traded companies."

No one can or will say how much money the porn industry has lost, but porn insiders won't deny that fewer films are being made, forcing actresses like Tanya Tate -- a 33-year-old who specializes in playing cougar roles -- to adapt.

"The budgets have been slashed," she told HuffPost. "Performers often have to do their own makeup."

Tate's solution has been to diversify. She started a PR agency, Star Factory PR, that represents herself and other adult industry actresses, and she also directs films.

Tate also has tried to broaden her base by capitalizing on her interest in cosplay, and dressing up in sexy superhero outfits. "I don't say I'm a porn star," she said. "I just say, 'I'm Tanya Tate and I have a cosplay site.' It's SFW [safe for work], but if they do further research on Facebook or Twitter, people will make the connection."

Other adult stars and companies are trying to make up for lost revenue by breaking into new products, according to Sherri Shaulis, the senior editor of Pleasure Products for AVN. "Video companies are breaking into novelties like sex toys or lingerie," Shaulis said. "The idea is that you can't download the novelty."

If times are as tough as porn industry insiders say, it's possible they could get worse with the passage of Measure B, a controversial condom-only porn measure that Los Angeles voters approved in November. The law requires adult film producers in the city to obtain a health permit before filming and performers to use condoms while engaged in sex. It also calls for health officials to be present on working sets and makes violators subject to fines and criminal charges.

But that's only, Akira says, if authorities can figure out how to implement it. "No one knows what's going to happen or how it will be enforced," she said. "Porn was illegal to shoot not that long ago and it still happened."

Roberts said despite the economic hardships the business has apparently faced in recent years, he thinks things are bouncing back. "I am seeing the light at the end of the tunnel," he said. "DVD sales are coming back from two years ago. It was doom and gloom for a while, but people who put out good high quality product survived."

Lou.m

Derrrp

Is the OP thinking of making a business plan to bring to the banks???

What makes people think of this???

No sssh i dina wana know

Stinicker

Most of the big name porn stars are also escorting, this is where they make the real money, the vids are just to make a name for themselves then they get some rich frustrated exec type who will drop a couple of grand for a few frolics. The word Porn is derived from the ancient Greek word pornographos, meaning, writings about prostitutes, which is what the whole porn industry is about really.

Untouchable Peasant

Lou.m wrote: »

What makes people think of this???

I'd say in general, things like this are thought of after someone has watched some blonde Californian beach babe get banged seven ways from Sunday and then glazed off with a finish that a Dunkin Donut's baker would be proud of.

Of course, then there's the Catholic guilt, the increase in oxytocin and the usual temporary deficiency of zinc which lead to deep feelings of empathy for the silicon enhanced lady's welfare. Fear of purgatory and the all consuming realization that this poor girl has just had to go through this hellish perverse ordeal, just to accommodate a sordid need the person has to see such filth and well, the only thing that one thinks in that tormented moment to redress this situation, is that at least the woman was well paid.

Oh but piracy is all but putting paid to that been a given and so the guilt ridden viewer is now in a position where they must condemn piracy, in effort to see that she is indeed well paid, particularly as they downloaded the scene themselves from an illegal torrent site.

A thread on a forum highlighting these girl's plight is now the only way of ending this post masturbatory torment, and should go a long way to easing the consuming guilt and see them well on their way to a good night's untroubled sleep with far less chance of being haunted by nightmares of a lone white stiletto being found down an alleyway in San Fernando Valley.

monkeysnapper

Don't know about anybody els but I quite while I was on top

B.A._Baracus

The reality is that porn stars (usually female more than men) are also strippers, cams models and escorts. Whores imo (urgh, bet someone is going to quote me on that)

As for the production of porn... the websites still make alot of money before someone torrents them. Accordingly parody porn is a hot seller these days.

loveBBhate

B.A._Baracus wrote: »

The reality is that porn stars (usually female more than men) are also strippers, cams models and escorts.

True and partaking in pornography is no different to an athlete going to the gym/training, etc... It's a hobby/practice that comes with the job.

B.A._Baracus

loveBBhate wrote: »

True and partaking in pornography is no different to an athlete going to the gym/training, etc... It's a hobby/practice that comes with the job.

Exactly. Goes hand in hand with the industry.
Porn is messed up. Hey let's be honest, who hasnt watched it. But the 'business' is so fucked up.

loveBBhate

B.A._Baracus wrote: »

Exactly. Goes hand in hand with the industry.
Porn is messed up. Hey let's be honest, who hasnt watched it. But the 'business' is so fucked up.

Goes knob in hand for the industry for me. But ya, to think a bazillion years ago Jesus was cruising about up the back of a unicorn preaching the good word and now we have an industry as such which I'd imagine is a high % of what people use when online. What'll we be looking at in another gazillion years? Old men celebrating the birth of a bitter yellow lemon fruit at a party barely clothed? Two girls sharing chocolate ice cream from the same cup? Wait...

Galwayguy35

Rabelais wrote: »

By exploiting young women to carry out increasingly sordid and depraved acts so men might inadvertently click on adverts.

So I suppose you never looked at porn did you?

Oh and by the way it's not just men that watch porn.

Daveysil15

Rabelais wrote: »

By exploiting young women to carry out increasingly sordid and depraved acts so men might inadvertently click on adverts.

What about the ones where the men are tied up and have their willies slapped by a dominatrix?

BMJD

it's mad how there are still magazines being produced

timthumbni

Untouchable Peasant wrote: »

Well, RoccoSiffredi.com, Woodmancastingx.com, Bangbros and EvilAngel would be the big four in porn circles and I'd say they do just fine with their subscriptions. You would rarely see their stuff on the tube sites and if you did, they would never be up that long.

Then their are the Netflix type ppv sites like Videobox etc which too bring in a mint.

New piracy laws are coming in soon which will give porn producers a fast way to find if their content has been uploaded anywhere online. I can't find the article now but read it a few weeks back and it was basically saying that the tube sites will soon just be all amateur content as the risk for those allowing the uploading of copyright content will be very high:

You sir have just spoiled my Sunday morning. If redtube goes down then I go down. Simples. Lol.

blade1

hedzball wrote: »

Scat is where its at!

I agree, bee bop bop bod op bop, bop bop bod op bop!

Ghost Buster

The porn industry co owns Kitten Soft and Charmin

Spring Onion

Untouchable Peasant wrote: »

I'd say in general, things like this are thought of after someone has watched some blonde Californian beach babe get banged seven ways from Sunday and then glazed off with a finish that a Dunkin Donut's baker would be proud of.

Of course, then there's the Catholic guilt, the increase in oxytocin and the usual temporary deficiency of zinc which lead to deep feelings of empathy for the silicon enhanced lady's welfare. Fear of purgatory and the all consuming realization that this poor girl has just had to go through this hellish perverse ordeal, just to accommodate a sordid need the person has to see such filth and well, the only thing that one thinks in that tormented moment to redress this situation, is that at least the woman was well paid.

Oh but piracy is all but putting paid to that been a given and so the guilt ridden viewer is now in a position where they must condemn piracy, in effort to see that she is indeed well paid, particularly as they downloaded the scene themselves from an illegal torrent site.

A thread on a forum highlighting these girl's plight is now the only way of ending this post masturbatory torment, and should go a long way to easing the consuming guilt and see them well on their way to a good night's untroubled sleep with far less chance of being haunted by nightmares of a lone white stiletto being found down an alleyway in San Fernando Valley.

Classic post!!!

Rabelais

Rabelais wrote: »

By exploiting young women to carry out increasingly sordid and depraved acts so men might inadvertently click on adverts.

There are people trying pretty hard to make it into the porn industry because they like it and the money can be good, both men and women. Both men and women watch it, not all men do, and not all women.

DEFTLEFTHAND

true-or-false wrote: »

There are people trying pretty hard to make it into the porn industry because they like it and the money can be good, both men and women. Both men and women watch it, not all men do, and not all women.

If anything going by the Theroux Doc men have it worse, only earning on average a third of what a woman can earn for one film.

Tipsy McSwagger

Hand over fist

Karl Stein

You wouldn't download a pizza.

Ken.

Read the story of Sasha Grey. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sasha_Grey

Actively sought out the porn industry and made a fortune. Now in main stream tv and films. Entourage being the main one.

For Forks Sake

Carlos Roca wrote: »

You wouldn't download a pizza.

Wanna bet?

KyussBishop

What I don't understand, is why the porn that is 'mainstream' is (by and large) so exploitative or demeaning towards the women involved - not much of it potrays sex in a positive way or as it really is.

That seems to be why 'porn' has a bad name to it - because of the way most of it portrays sex, which is completely unrealistic/fake (and can be pretty depressing), when it doesn't have to be that way.