An article on Slate about the company Mindgeek caught my attention, and it might amuse a few of you folks. Link below.
Some random thoughts and reactions - This seems to explain the increasing number of porn stars working as providers. Hard to believe this company exists and I never heard of them. I guess you can ignore antitrust regulations if you are in an industry everyone wants to pretend does not exist. I do not believe the article represents the business model with complete accuracy - while I have not visited the porn tube sites (not sure why, because I like porn, they just never worked for me), I have been told that the clips on them are not exactly pirated copies of scenes from the pay sites, more like short clips followed by invitations to subscribe to the pay site to see the whole scene (though the clips are enough to use to get off, I hear), so they are at least making some effort to generate revenue for the content providers. It does seem crazy that a business that began by pirating content grew big enough to buy the content providers. I do not buy the idea that if (or when) Mindgeek crashes and burns (and it sounds like the regulatory authorities are more interested in making that happen than forcing the company to comply with regulations and survive) it will bring down the porn industry with it. There will be a market for content and someone will provide that content. zigI've just about given up, and I used to watch lots of porn also, but got sick and tired of always having my computer crash.
Now I settle for gals' photos here on TER.
Now I settle for gals' photos here on TER.
Or at least the companies they own. They were formerly known as Brazzers. I've worked for them a few times. They own Digital Playground, Twistys and many, many more companies. A lot of people in the porn industry do not like Brazzers what so ever. They own several tube sites....and I feel that they've killed off membership sales for the "little guys".
A lot of sites suddenly developed a common sign in portal, which promotes special deals for other site, and they even offer group subscriptions these days.
According to the article you have it backwards, however - Mindgeek started out as a Porn Tube site, then bought some more of those sites, then bought Brazzers and other content providers, not the other way around. OTOH, the article does mention that most performers dislike them because they pay shit and play hardball, so that is consistent with what you say.
My guess is that someone or other will bring current ownership down, just as they brought down the two previous sets of owners. We accept porn and it is legal, of course, but I think there are a lot of reasons why porn companies have a hard time growing past a certain point. These guys are past that point, and people are gunning for them. I guess I would object to that if it did not seem pretty clear that they are assholes.
zig
These guys do sound like bad news. While I have previously called into question cries of an impending porn apocalypse I can see where a handful of stupid, greedy and shortsighted individuals drive the whole business into turmoil. I think some enterprising company is going to have to lead the way with encrypted content or some consolidated response to these guys. Just as these guys figured out how to do what they're doing I have faith that someone will figure out how to fight back effectively.