Contradiction in Terms?

I raised my eyebrow a notch when I read this request on GFY this morning:

Spam me with solo girl sites that are NOT part of a large sponsor. Sites that can provide content for galleries and provide custom FHGs.

What, you may ask, do I find "funny" about the request? It would mostly be the "not part of a large sponsor" combined with "can provide custom FHGs". How does a small program manage to run the site(s) AND sit around creating custom galleries for an affiliate? Either they never sleep, or they are incredibly talented, or they're making a lot more money than we are and can hire someone to make special promo content for affiliates. I don't even do custom galleries for my MEMBERS.

I also wonder what "large" sponsor means. What constitutes a "large" sponsor versus a small or medium sponsor? Obviously some people are interpreting him as requesting "sponsors with sites that are not overexposed", but it seems to me if you have three to ten solo girl sites in your portfolio (and none of those girls ARE the sponsor doing the work of running the actual program, but are just bought content or paid models), you are a "large" sponsor unless you consider yourself small in terms of profit and exposure, in which case you'd think the average GFY sponsor type wouldn't want to post in that thread since all it seems to mean is that you must not be very successful to have all those sites and still be "small" or at least NOT large. Of course I'm nitpicking now, though, since accuracy is not what's important . . . spam is.

Oh well, I posted in the thread but I'm sure it will be ignored and/or look like I'm a bitter poor little asshole who doesn't have a deep enough commitment to her affiliates to whip out custom galleries for a potential affiliate.

A First

This week we're experiencing a big FIRST. Before I tell you what it is, let me explain the basics of who does the work on our sites:

TUCKER AND I.

Long story short: for the past six years I/we have been doing almost everything ourselves. I've bought a couple of scripts, software, equipment, costumes. NakedHosting takes care of all of our hosting needs and the technical side of that. But really, I have only paid for THINGS, never hiring actual PEOPLE to do specific jobs. Sure, we pay affiliates, but only when they make sales; it's not the same as HIRING someone. And yeah, we've gotten incredible free help from friends and colleagues, but again . . . not the same as paying for help. I started out doing everything alone and in the past six years have only added one person (Tucker) to the "staff".

This week that changes! This week we are paying a videographer / video editor to shoot us, edit the footage, encode it, etc. It will be the first time we've really paid someone to do work for our sites. I cannot describe how intensely excited I am!

The bulk of our content is solo stuff since Tucker and I shoot each other; doing couples stuff is really hard when you're shooting it yourself, and I think not as fun when you're worrying about being a photographer AND a fucker. Plus I really really really find video editing monotonous, and can't afford the time or money to get the right tools and learn to use them. As a result, I feel like a lot of our video content is sub-par. But I'm *dying* to offer members more hardcore stuff (note: by "hardcore" I do not mean "extreme" as in setting each other on fire while fucking telephone poles, etc.); plus I just really love watching Tucker (or Delia) and I doing it. I love almost all of the content we do have featuring us together, and I know it will only be a million times better with Ron shooting the video, offering insights and suggestions and direction, and editing it.

So. This is going to be a landmark week for us. Hiring someone to shoot content probably doesn't measure on most porn companies' "landmark dates" register (for most of them it's a REQUIREMENT, not an option), but for indies like us? Whoah! It's a BIG DEAL!

Oops. I just remembered that I paid a friend to build a computer for me back in 2002 and do some follow-up work after that, so this is actually not a first. But it feels like it!!!

I look forward to working with Ron a lot, milking his brain and talents, and moving towards contracting out more of our work in the future. Though I tended to be one of those people who hated group work in school (and I still love working on projects by myself), I have come to appreciate working in teams. With the right people working together the process and end results are better than anything you could imagine doing alone. Ron is definitely "the right people".

Honestly we can't truly afford him right now, but thanks to one of my long-time members' sweet donations, I have just enough of a cushion to earmark some money for Ron so that he knows we value his work and are serious about budgeting him in for more. He is worth way more than we'll be paying him this week, that's for sure.

Guess this means I will have to hurry up and make a nice leak-free clean tour for affiliates to promote SpyOnUs.com! Now . . . if I could just find the money to pay someone to do THAT job . . . someday!