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Ask HN: Are there any innovative startups in the porn/adult industry?

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Re: Ask HN: Are there any innovative startups in the porn/adult industry?

#101

Post by srybchin »

durkie wrote: post #24

We're in the process of launching our first product at Comingle( http://www.comingle.io ), making Arduino-based, open source and hackable sex toys. We're making a sex toy platform (our library is named OSSex of course) so that it won't matter if your sex toy is made by guys. You can reprogram it to your liking, attach sensors that respond to your feedback or even build your own. It is super hard to find a payment pro…

WOW! Looks very interesting!

We are not denying that it's the banks that are the problem. Last I checked, the money that my company generates is as green as the money as an non-adult company makes. It's just a shame that banks and companies that work with those banks, like Stripe, are making blanket statements that all adult related businesses are risk.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any innovative startups in the porn/adult industry?

#102

Post by cindygallop »

frequentflyeru wrote: post #42

It just surprises me that mainstream brands haven't embraced advertising on porn sites. There is no reason why there couldn't be a Hulu style high end porn site with real ads from like Budweiser, Old Spice, Mountain Dew, Red Bull, Comedy Central. There might be backlash for the first company to advertise but after that I can't imagine people would care.

Porn sites have tried, but it's really tough. We want to help break down the social barriers that prevent that. However, here is one mainstream brand who wholeheartedly embraced that and wrote up the BEST.ADVERTISING.EFFECTIVENESS.CASESTUDY.EVER. This is Eat24's hilarious report on 'How To Advertise On A Porn Site':

http://blog.eat24hours.com/how-to-advertise-on-a-porn-websit...

and here's what we plan at MakeLoveNotPorn as our version of advertising - Forget Sex In Advertising, How About Advertising In #realworldsex?

http://talkabout.makelovenotporn.tv/2013/09/25/forget-sex-in...

Re: Ask HN: Are there any innovative startups in the porn/adult industry?

#103

Post by cindygallop »

srybchin wrote: post #99
cindygallop wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's precisely why you should. :) Seriously, I and my team and every other #sextech entrepreneur are working to change the public attitude. For the people ahead of the curve - OH MY GOD THE MONEY TO BE MADE :)

I agree. Why not? It doesn't make you any less respectable or a bad person. You might be surprised as to how much you like it!

And on this topic - can I introduce Peiqi Su's fantastic ITP installation, the Penis Wall? :)

http://itp.nyu.edu/shows/thesis2014/peiqi-su/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJw-JUmjq0U

Re: Ask HN: Are there any innovative startups in the porn/adult industry?

#104

Post by _h0lw »

cindygallop wrote: post #81

And to answer your question even more specifically - here's a list of founders and ventures doing innovative things in this space: Kit Maloney, Oactually http://oactually.com/ Cyan Banister, Zivity https://www.zivity.com/ Tina Gong, HappyPlaytime http://happyplaytime.com/ Sarah Jayne Kinney, UnboundBox https://unboundbox.com/ Dema Tio & Hermione Way, Vibease http://www.vibease.com/ Danny Wax & Tyler Elick, Spreadshee…

Hi. [name-redacted] with [company-name-redacted] here. We're a sex-positive sextech startup that synchronizes vibrators to adult videos. Our web service is built on some very innovative technology.

What Cindy said about how difficult it is for an adult startup is absolutely true. We're launching our pilot soon, but this technology would've reached market much more quickly if we were mainstream. We typically can't talk as openly about our ideas. Some adult startup founders run into trouble with family and friends. VC is also incredibly challenging because they nobody wants to be known as "the adult VC" in a financial world that patently discriminates against anything labeled adult.

At [company-name-redacted] we don't produce our own content or our own vibrators. Our website is completely clean, but because we have links to the videos on 3rd party adult sites where users can experience [company-name-redacted], PayPal or your typical payment processors aren't willing to let us use their services.

We definitely encourage you to follow all of the innovative companies in this space, just know that, for the time, our products will take a little longer to reach market than you might expect.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any innovative startups in the porn/adult industry?

#105

Post by cindygallop »

sudokent wrote: post #89
cindygallop wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're keen to use bitcoin and have been talking to various people about this for years. Would you believe bitcoin merchants are also susceptible to 'No adult content'?!!

What merchants are those? I've read through many acceptable use policies and haven't seen "No Adult Content" yet. Thanks! edit:s/man/many/

I actually would prefer not to name names because am in discussions to get over that hump...but I've unfortunately encountered this in several.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any innovative startups in the porn/adult industry?

#106

Post by cindygallop »

kingkawn wrote: post #92
cindygallop wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funnily enough, while that used to be true, it's no longer the case. The tech world has advanced to the point that it's outstripped the porn industry, which is struggling for the business reasons I outline here in my open letter in Wired, 'Don't Block Porn, Disrupt It': http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-08/14/cindy-gallop-... That's what makes #sextech a huge, huge opportunity - including bringing everything t…

I think it is still the case. The production of porn is democratizing and becoming a smaller and smaller economic blip as its production dissipates, so I agree that the economic model is hurting. I also think its serving a valuable social function which is exposing our expectations and fantasies of sex as the ludicrous oddities that they are, despite our protestations that we are mature and civilized.

At MakeLoveNotPorn we're entirely pro-porn - our tagline is 'Pro-sex. Pro-porn. Pro-knowing the difference.' And we're utterly non-judgemental - #realworldsex is all-inclusive, of anything and everything anyone in the world likes doing. This is what we mean when we say we're not porn, not amateur, but #realworldsex:

http://talkabout.makelovenotporn.tv/2013/04/01/what-is-realw...

Porn in the abstract is absolutely, as you say, a valuable tool for exploring our sexuality, finding out what turns us on, learning there are other people with the same tastes out there. The issue isn't porn, but the absence of an open healthy dialogue around sex in the real world, which is what lies at the heart of the business problems this comment stream highlights, which in turn force the porn industry down worse and worse routes: when you force anything into the shadows and underground, you make it a lot easier for bad things to happen, and you make it a lot more difficult for good things to happen.

That same lack of open healthy discussion around sex is why these social problems exist - the ones that MakeLoveNotPorn is out to tackle:

http://www.ippr.org/assets/media/publications/attachments/yo...

Re: Ask HN: Are there any innovative startups in the porn/adult industry?

#107

Post by brettz »

parados wrote: post #64
brettz wrote: post #53

We do pretty innovative and fun things at Pornhub. We're hiring too if you're interested.

I'm curious, assuming you are hiring tech staff, do you find any difference in the quantity or quality of applicants compared to other, non adult, tech companies?

Quantity and quality is the same. We are in Montreal though so there is not as much talent as other cities.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any innovative startups in the porn/adult industry?

#108

Post by cindygallop »

kefka wrote: post #6
staunch wrote: post #3

VR porn is a new area with difficult problems to solve.

Given my new position at my workplace, I now have access to all sorts of gadgets and tech stuff. One thing I've been playing with is a EEG headset with Oculus Rift. My initial idea is to utilize brain patterns with Oculus content to increase certain emotions. For example, when one is playing Doom 3, the monsters come out closer and scarier when you are already frightened. Or if you're bored, nothing happens to try to…

90% of the audience at any Oculus Rift presentation/demo are thinking 'Sex' :)

Re: Ask HN: Are there any innovative startups in the porn/adult industry?

#109

Post by brettz »

tormeh wrote: post #10
shittyanalogy wrote: post #8

What are you looking for, innovative content delivery, production style, search technology, payment schemes? What problems for example? All the main video sites you go to are startups that are trying to innovate and make money. Porn is a very competitive industry. Pornhub and redtube for example are innovative startups it's just hard to amit it to ourselves because they are peddling smut.

Their websites are horrible, though, and the content is pretty meh.

What's horrible about them? (I work there so I'm curious)

Re: Ask HN: Are there any innovative startups in the porn/adult industry?

#110

Post by sunshinerag »

cindygallop wrote: post #84
JohnBooty wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know you've probably learned this already from your experience, but for other readers: The (possibly) surprising thing here is that banks aren't moralizing here. You can walk into any adult bookstore and pay with a regular old credit card just fine, thank you. Visa and Mastercard are not averse to allowing you to pay for porn. The reason why banks and credit card companies don't want to be involved with online porn…

As per my commment below, we get virtually no chargebacks at http://makelovenotporn.com/ because we are a different kind of business operating in a different kind of way - out in the open, socially acceptable/shareable - but the financial institutions' compliance departments won't even have that conversation. :(

Have you considered bitcoins as payment?
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