I'll take a stab at these for you mate.
* Right time right place?
Yup, plus I had been around for long enough and had a good grasp on basic traffic generation. If I wasn't able to send sponsors sales as an affiliate taking the leap and opening up my own paysite would be a simply a tax write off.
* Had the content, so why not?
Exactly. Years of bought niche content used to push other niche paysites as as an affiliate. So I had enough to start up a paysite.
* Felt you could do a better job than what was available?
Yes and No. In my niche yes there are a lot of pox sites, but then there are also a lot of good quality sites as my comp.
* You were or are the the focus of the site?
Nope.
* Had traffic and were tired of being just an affiliate?
Yuppers. Why send x amount of sales to someone else for x ratio on 50% revshare. When I could send the same sales on x ratio to my own paysite and get at least 60-70% minus processing fees. (not factoring in after payout overheads/running costs)
* Accusations of sponsor shaving and other losses drove you to it?
As the sponsors I primarily pushed were all revshare based, no this was never a factor.
* The niche you desired was not available or was done poorly?
Both, just decided it was time for me to take a stab at it. With years of content and existing traffic even if it all went tits up the loss would be minimal.
* More money in paysites, the American dream, the American Day dream, etc?
Dunno I'm from Aussie land.
* You are of the personality type where you must be in control?
Nope, but we all are in control of our businesse/s in one way or another.
* Other reasons, that you will share or not share?
As an affiliate you don't get credit for upsells, ability to send existing cc verrified members newsletters promoting other products/services/sites. You also don't get to play about with the exit traffic.
-N