jayeff

Except that by any standards except those of a couple of twenty-somethings, they aren't "raking it in". Not even if you assume the estimates are accurate and you ignore the risks and uncertain future they face.

No argument. It is remarkable that for the past decade and more, pretty much anyone with a PC has been able to take a shot at a 6- or 7-figure income and plenty have succeeded. But that doesn't change the reality that despite the thousands who one way or another work in online porn, the whole industry is worth less than single companies in other fields.

I once watched two of my clients walk across the tarmac at London airport and each got into his own private 747. Until that moment, I thought I was doing pretty well for myself. And I went on to do better, but the last time my then company changed hands, its sales were FIFTY times higher than when I sold it. I have no problem admitting that I couldn't even conceive of operating on that scale, nor would I try to pretend that I could have made it happen.

The point being that although many who have been successful in this industry are not thinking small by their own standards, they are from a wider perspective. That is why people focus on the relatively small sums of money they assume they earn from watermarked content being distributed by file sharing sites and not on the long-term damage such sites represent. That is why the self-validation of being able to socialize with others who have been successful, is a higher priority than saying "To hell with it: you damage my business and I'm going to make you pay for it". That is why to so many the largely illusory notion of complete independence is more important than cooperating in areas where cooperation makes more sense than competition.