Wanna be in business 5 years from now?
 

Just had this long discussion with someone who insisted that picture sites will always be around on the Internet and making money.

I can't see it. High speed access will become common enough maybe not in 5 but in 10 years so that TV and the Internet are a level medium. Does anyone want to flip to channel 4and look at a photo album? Don't think so. If you have the ability to see full quality video as a consumer, you aren't going to bother with pictures (in the same medium anyway - magazines will always sell because of where you can take them).

Anyone disagree?

Porn mags still sold after the VCR was invented.

its all about the traffic.

think it all depends on the content.

And some people will never have broadband.

I think videos will get more important but nothing can really beat a high quality photo. I think picture sites will always be in demand.

Why are playboys and hustler's still on the shelf?

I guess people really do read the articles! LOL!

DH

Did you read my whole post? I said:
"...you aren't going to bother with pictures (in the same medium anyway - magazines will always sell because of where you can take them)."

Picture sites will be sharing the same medium as video sites. Same place to view, same entertainment model. Won't work. Magazines and VHS never competed for the same mode of communication. Imagine if it was possible to have a magazine with moving video pages instead of pictures. Which one would people buy?

still photography will never disappear as a staple of erotica and porn. there will always be MANY people who remain devoted to photographs.

movies no doubt are what will be most popular in a broadband world but nude photography will always have its following.

I never look at video unless I need to for the job. Pictures I still do.

Did they throw away paintings when they made the first photo? nope, they are still around

you can't use 100% video content to make a complete tour... unless you wanna use crappy vid captures.

well said! :thumbsup

I appreciate a good picture too. I also agree there will always be parts of the world without broadband but it will be a small minority of our customers eventually.

I challange anyone to compare conversion and especially retention on their paysites with and without video. You add video and live feeds your numbers jump by leaps and bounds. You have some vid now and take it off only for pics... you'll be lucky to convert 15% of your trials. As video gets better due to technology and broadband propogation, the effects to sales will only get more dramatic.

Again, not competeing for the same medium. A photo is not a signifcant sensory upgrade to a paitning. n fact it may be a downgrade in most cases. But to a horny man looking to whack off, a video is a significant sensory upgrade to a photo.

Actually I'd argue the best medium is your imagination but that's a whole other argument.

Videos and feeds will be the future. I bet pay-per-view thingies will be big sometime soon, when picture quality REALLY is comparable to tv or DVD.

Not right now. Interesting idea though. Too costly. And now you still need great pics without a doubt. I'm talking 5-10 years from now...

Me as a designer, I have to be ready to make interactive video productions and use programs like Lightwave in the future because making static Photoshop pages will become less and less needed.

in 5-10 years from now, i feel you'll still have to catch the viewers eye within 8 seconds. it's gonna be interesting to see what happens, i wouldn't dare to try and predict the future...it'd probably bite me in the ass.

pay per view and porn on tv will never be a level medium with the internet,

remember many ppl are still stuck in the mind set that porn is dirty and not meant for the household.

as for pictures compared to videos, i think that its all about content, it has nothing to do with videos or pics its all about original ideas. so to answer ur question i must say no it will not replace it.

you seem stuck on this notion that the Internet is like the television, a medium for and ultimately only for video.

Wrong - the Internet has been a huge boon for the written word - millions of people who probably don't read 2 books a year or a daily newspaper do read Internet sites. I could care less what videos ESPN.com has, I'm there to read the articles and columns. The blogging revolution, personal websites, email, chatboards have turned people back to the old fashioned art of writing their thoughts like people did generations before.

I'm on broadband, i probably spend 10% of my time online with anything to do with video, non porn or porn.

Okay.

I happen agree with your original post to a point. Videos will be MUCH more prominent than they are now.

But they won't be everything.

So while I happen to think videos will be the main attraction, there will always be a place for pics in the world of online porn.

technology move slow to being adapted because geeks can never agree on anything. Everything today was supposed to be 100% flash and xml. Ill just evolve with the times.

I think the key to the matter is diversity. YOu will have to bring more interactive parts into the sites. Online games, 360 degree scrollable rooms with models etc. You seem to forget that not only broadband gets more and more used but also the technics and multimedia possibilities will be evolving.

We have always made a very good living at this but as soon as we added broadband video to our main site our sign-ups went through the roof. :2 cents:

I'm not arguing one way or the other...but, there are still people using the rotary phone...

I see the future as having sites that offer variety and cater to those with and without high speed, high tech equipment.

i wanna see beta tapes make a comeback.

I agree with that. My original post is of course skewed to my primary viewpoint (helps get people talking =] ). I think it will be primarily video and live interaction and some stuff we haven't thoguht of yet. And yes people iwll always use it for the written word too but in our line of work video is still king.

Right, but the question isn't whether or not people will still USE something, the question is will you be able to make a living selling something.
When it comes to rotary phones, I don't think you can. And in a few years it'll be really hard to just sell "pictures" and make a living in online porn.
:2 cents:

All I know is that we will still be in business by catering to what our customers demand...

Right now... they want pix, they want video, they want stories... and as long as they are giving us their hard earned cash...

We will be bending over backwards to make sure they get it...

I am a big fan of vintage porn... obviously I am not the only one... and twenty years from now people will collect old hustler's or penthouse so they can see girls with hairy bushes or big hairdos...

Old porn and the medium that delivers it will never die... just go to catalog pricing... that is mantra to run your company by...

In the word sof Bud... True.

I also said this:
I think sites will offer diversity for those who have and those who don't have....I think successful sites do that now, by offering pics and stories and high speed video and low speed video....as the technology improves, sites will add....but, I can't see them taking away.......

As for rotary phones, someone's still using them enough because most of the voice systems will ask first off..'If you are dialing from a touch tone phone, please press 1. If not, stay on the line and an operator will be with you.'

There are things that can be captured/depicted in photographs that cannot be accurately depicted/captured on camera.

take this picture for example:
http://banners.clubseventeen.com/mai...ick/Ginger.jpg

some people could easily jerk off to that one picture.

Thats an amazing photo. I think Also because for technology we tend to be early adapters, we assume that for everyone. I had just read a very large percentage of America isnt on the net and doesnt want to be. I think the foreign markets are going to come more into play and those people will be on dialup in five years. I think what happens with Acarcia (that might be spelled wrong, the video patient people) will tell the tale of videos role on the net. Also if W gets another four year to step on us, that will make another difference in what happens.

I'll adapt with the industry. I plan to be in it for a long tme, so I'd at least better learn. :P

i've been in this biz almost as long as mark (early 1996 for me) and i must admit, i bookmark every thread he starts and save it under 'WebMaster Info/Advice' folder of my Opera browser.... Thanks for the introspect reformed mullet-man!

And at the end of each month nowadays they ARE STILL SITTING on the shelf.

I've been investing in the adult entertainment industry since 1984, almost 20 great years. I've seen many things come and go, many stay, and many great ideas never catch on.

The Net bumped the video guys and the adult magazine publishers on the back of their heads. I think they thought it would be just a techier version of the content that was on BBS's at that time. It killed all the big mag's circulations. The video guys had to scramble to digitize all their films into 1's and 0's.

Pictures will be here forever. They capture the moment. They capture and freeze the money shots so guys can get lost in the stillness of each frame of their fantasies.

What you'll see in 5 years will be jaw dropping ultra high definition displays that will be large, with such precise detail, perfect color, and utter clarity that the pictures will appear totally lifelike and 3 dimensional. Guys will be completely mesmerized by them. It will look like Jenna is spread and dripping wet like they can reach out to touch and feel her soft moist sensuous lips.

So all is bright. The future is ours, without a doubt. Billions of eyes await our creations. Billions of dollars await to be signed up.

We sell pure, raw sex. Nothing on earth is more addicting than that overwhelming desire within all of us. Pictures are the windows for our fantasies.

good one:thumbsup

I think there will be a shift in focus, but stills will continue to be important if for nothing else than advertisement and tours, as said before. Obviously better video quality over high speed connections will become desireable and the market will expand likewise.

One thing I see in the future is a growing demand for interactive porn. There's a guy out there now that comes to mind who makes interactive video-quality flash files of girls who take their shirts off and spread their legs upon mouseover. I can see these files becomming more complex over the years and the masturbation experience may be quite interactive indeed.

I have a dream... that one day no movies and pictures will be around, but all is combined in virtual porn and we shall never look back.. Maybe not in 5 years, maybe never, but fun to think about nonetheless. Man is a creative and horny animal.

They have technology already to pretty create a laser generated person in 3 D in front of you. The thing is the computing power and equipment you need isn't economically feasible currently.

well put sir

I will attempt my best to chat with college buddies in citigroup and meril to snatch that IPO.

The latest I heard is that this is not only economically difficult, but technologically as well. Logically (not saying I'm an expert in the field), the hardest part is creating the sensor model. Considering the fact that computing power is exploding and getting cheaper by the millisecond, it may one day become affordable. Don't know if I'll be alive when that happens but the dream will not fade.
"one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind"

Dang man. Thanks for the kind words! MInd if I quote that on the new LUMYR when it's done?

When can I have a virtual porn star here in my lap? Man if I was on Star Trek NExt Gen I woulda got kicked off the ship for using the holodeck to get laid every night!

I agree 100%. I shoot video, I love video, but still photos just have a way of capturing a moment, a mood, a something that video will never be able to capture.

That is why we try to offer both, videos and stills. They complement eachother well (and vidcaps do not qualify as stills!).

I'm not arguing that photos will go away. I'm saying that the return on investment for picture content will be much lower than it is today.

It's not just video even but we're going to see a day when essentially we get interaactive television. Imagine viideo on demand of all your favorite TV shows (they just get posted at their live run time) and being able to choose your own camera angle and to see extras and to maybe respond to a commercial right there or get more info on the product in the commercial... This is where things are going.

I prefer pictures of video,,

Ok so I am weird

Mark your last post popped a memory into my head - being able to interact with commercials.
There was a little product introduced... oh, maybe 2 years ago now? That did just that. Copycat or Cybercat or something?
It was like a pen (shaped like a stretched out cat) that had an infrared serial bar reader in the end. Attached to your computer via serial port.
When you flipped through a magazine and saw an ad or article that you liked that had the cat symbol and bar code, you could simply scan the code with your little cat-mouse thingee and your browser would automatically open up and go to that company's site.
It also had a microphone, and it listened when you were watching tv. Commercials that were cat-enabled would put out a little sound - unnoticable to you - that the cat would pick up, and again it would pop open your browser and take you right to that company's web page.
Interactive commercials, indeed. It was all the talk for about two months and then died out.
I guess the makers didn't truly realize that people DON'T like advertising - especially not enough to interact with it!

5 years down the road video will probably be king of the hill, but pictures won't be *that* far behind. Just knocked off of their post a bit. No amount of video can replace one great picture. Video makes you lazy, takes care of everything for you... with a picture, your imagination is seeded but it's not spoonfed. You can still create a fantasy around that picture and fully experience that fantasy uninterrupted.
Can't do that with video.

Video has its definite advantages - directing the action, being right there *live* with the girl and chatting with her, interaction... and there will be a point where if you don't have video on your site you may as well not open it... but still photographs will never go away and there will always be a steady demand for them.

Now think of the movie Demolition Man where Sandra Bullock puts on that little skullcap thing and is instantly transported into a sexual fantasy with full sensory overload... THAT would kill online porn. :glugglug

Carrie great post but I have to say you take porn way to seriously :)

I want to be retired in 5 years

;)))