How user generated porn completely changed the online adult industry
It's common knowledge that pornography helped shape and grow the Internet. While it was founded as a means to share data and then rationalised as a good way for people to connect; human nature is always destined to take over and therefore adult sites started to pop up.
Previously premium cable/satelite channels were the only means for users to see adult content with printed media taking the backseat. However once the adult industry found its way online one of the biggest businesses in the history of mankind found a way to grow exponentially.
Porn helped grow the Internet
As the Internet gained in popularity, the number of adult oriented websites exploded exponentially and a business model was born; using the same subscription model used television, sites were established that allowed users to pay a fixed fee and have access to instant content.
Obviously as technology improved the adult industry followed - faster connections brought around an increase in video and said goodbye to premium-rate dialers. However, with the second dot-com boom (the often cited "web2.0 boom") the whole industry started to shift.
Web2.0 moved the goalposts dramatically
Web2.0 was a term banded around to represent user generated content and various forms of data syndication; it was obvious once Youtube became popular that a user-generated pornography video site wouldn't be far behind. User submitted content could then be uploaded to the site and served for free...
Suddenly sites such as Youporn, Pornotube and Redtube (to name the only three I am aware of) sprung up and changed the business model. Users could see all content, all the time. No subscriptions, no fees, just user submitted content.
Free content = no more paid subscriptions
Suddenly new subscriptions to premium paid services dwindled as users found comparable content for free on these new sites; which in turn spawned dozens of similar sites and moved the goalposts for the adult industry. So how can the conventional, premium sites still survive? I don't know. I can only imagine they survive by creating their own services and monetise them correctly (i.e. not with subscriptions but heavily promoted CPA campaigns).
So one of the core industries that helped found the Internet has had to adapt and shift with the times and there probably won't be a way back. Even if they clamp down on copyrighted material there's still such a volume of genuine user generated content (read amateur) footage that the damage is already done.
Pornography is free because of the web2.0 trend and the only battle for the adult industry is whether they can monopolise on the situation as they always have.
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