IN THE SPOTLIGHT

www.virtubucks.com

Web Site: www.virtubucks.com

VirtuMike started VirtuCon in mid-1995, which according to him seems like, “45 dog years ago, or like 65 Internet years ago.” VirtuMike has mastered the nude Public/Mardi Gras/Spring Break niche over the past couple years.IN THE SPOTLIGHT

www.virtubucks.com

Web Site: www.virtubucks.com

VirtuMike started VirtuCon in mid-1995, which according to him seems like, “45 dog years ago, or like 65 Internet years ago.” VirtuMike has mastered the nude Public/Mardi Gras/Spring Break niche over the past couple years. He also puts out a newsletter called Porndexter’s Mail, which is a pretty raw adult publication with a political slant. VirtuMike also produces The Cyberbabe News, which is one of the most popular anchor hosted newscasts on the web. Says VirtuMike about the program, “We’re paying webmasters to link to that one.” The team at Virtucon also produces content with a large library. “We have a few new products in the works, answering many problems facing webmasters. I like to think of VirtuCon as a solutions company more than anything else,” says VirtuMike.

YNOT: What drew you to the industry VirtuMike?
VirtuMike: When I started, it was to push a drink guide I wrote with one of my fraternity brothers. One thing led to another and next thing I know I’m getting fan mail asking for fixups with the models. I never wanted to be in the business, but the people I work with are the best, I couldn’t imagine another business where we could all be competition yet be such close friends.

YNOT: What type of work were you doing, if any, before you started in the biz?
VirtuMike: I started this gig when I was in grad school. I was teaching CIS at a college and running an ISP at the time. Before that I was a wheeler-dealer promotions guy, specializing in coupons. I also did some database work for an audiotext company doing psychics.

YNOT: What types of sites and/or targeted business did you start with?
VirtuMike: Originally it was MixMaster Mike’s Drink Guide. When people weren’t searching enough for my keywords, I realized I would need to combine it with other things people wanted to see, like models and other chicks. I made a linklist to hotchick sites (which were very few and far between in 1995) and let the traffic grow from mostly typeins and search engines. My friend across the hall in the dorm had this totally hot friend come visit and I told her she should be a model…she eventually became the original Cyberbabe. After that it was a whole lot easier to get more models, but the first one was truly the hardest.

YNOT: Where did you begin gathering info about the business?
VirtuMike: I would have to say I made my own rules. Like Frankie said, “I did it my way”. No information existed back then. YNOT came about after that, and was the one and only resource site for years.

YNOT: Did you already have friends in the business?
VirtuMike: Nope, not a one. There were no paysites yet because people had not figured out how to charge people for transactions online yet. At that point it was still mostly for fun. Nobody expected anything of what came about.

YNOT: Give us your thoughts on how easy or difficult it was for you to get started.
VirtuMike: It was incredibly hard to start. At that point, nobody knew anything, like registering domains, licensing, or traffic. Nobody was selling content, and all the video guys I approached with the idea laughed at me. The girls all yelled, “Get away from me you pervert!” Well they still yell that at me but now it’s different. I was fortunate enough to find a brilliant group of guys in Miami that had a design and hosting company that needed my resume to get more corporate clients, and I needed their hosting, so we both had a pretty sweet deal. After a while, they split up and I had grown so much that we parted. At that point, we were producing our own content. It was so hard to find content licenses –- everyone was either stealing content or they all bought all the same stuff from the same people, so all the sites looked the same. We were in the live feeds business, so we had a huge advantage with content, and I used it to grow my business.

no other way to go but up.

YNOT: Any funny or interesting stories about the business that you’d like to share?
VirtuMike: TONS. But if I told you, I’d lose both friends and traffic.

YNOT: What changes would you like to see made in the adult Internet industry?
VirtuMike: I hope that none of you hold this against me, these are just my opinions … I would like to see more responsible webmasters. Remember, this isn’t the Wild West anymore. The trend now is to be greedy. We have a set of ethics that we must follow, which includes proper marketing, confidentiality, customer service, and relationships with other webmasters. If we don’t line ourselves up properly, outside forces will force us to line up, and we will have been much better off doing it ourselves. I’d like to see people not stealing intellectual property such as copyrights and trademarks, rather using them properly per their license agreements.

I’d also like to see TGP2 replace TGP. The TGP2 system is a far superior mechanism. Webmasters would see massive increases in conversions and clicks, and a significant decrease in bandwidth and upset parents. The problem with the TGP2 vs. TGP is that if everyone switched except for one, that one will get all the traffic. It’s the prisoners’ game revisited. The surfers really prefer the old TGP system, so the whole industry has to visibly stand behind TGP2. For the record, I do.

YNOT: What do you love about the adult Internet industry?
VirtuMike: The people, first and foremost…I have made such great friends in the industry, and I am truly impressed with the way they think. All the old timers pretty much have the same mindset and story — ask around, you’ll see. I also truly appreciate the science behind the numbers model. It is remarkably pure marketing; research can be performed with instant and incredibly accurate data results. You just hold out your (stats) hand and there are your answers to everything!

YNOT: What do you dislike?
VirtuMike: Crooks, content crooks, traffic crooks, hackers, incompetence, government intervention, bullshitters, liars, anyone that stands in my way, the religious radicals, censors, irresponsible parents, lazy people, greedy people, overpriced football tickets, Brussels sprouts, airlines, toll roads, waiting in line, and getting locked out of your hotel room, naked, while trying to figure out how to get the Venetian to let you back into your room without having to streak the casino (not that this has ever happened to me or anyone I know, twice).

YNOT: Where do you see yourself in one year? Five years?
VirtuMike: I see myself doing exactly what I’m doing now. Just more of it. I used to say I had a five-year plan about four years ago, which I truly believed in. I thought I would be retired by now. Well I don’t think I want to retire yet. It’s too much fun. Five years from now I would hope things don’t change. I wish I could believe that but I’m an alarmist. There are so many factors that could affect the future, but I believe I have a pretty accurate vision of the road ahead. I don’t think it’ll affect me as much as other people –- we already have a painfully clean ship.

YNOT: What are your thoughts on the future of the adult Internet industry?
VirtuMike: I think that we’re looking at a situation where a few of the bad apples are spoiling the bushel. Because of the minimal barriers to entry, we can see new faces all the time. There exists a whole wave of new people, many are great webmasters, but many have the short-term mentality. That short-term thinking will result in the quick buck, but in the long term, they are forcing outside influences to adversely affect the industry as a whole. These influences include massive negative databases, forced auditing, governmental raids, anti-spamming laws, excessive chargeback fees, intolerably high reserve funds, etc. The industry has enough enemies; we don’t need more. However, there will always be a demand for the product, and as long as we can continue to charge for it, we’re ok.

I think that the future is not very promising. While everyone is claiming sales are down, I believe that is more of a dilution issue. Years ago there were few paysites, no TGP’s, and everything was all based on linklists and engines. Now it’s all TGP, CJ, and spam. I miss the old days. Now we’re looking at a future of everyone giving away everything. Peer-to-Peer is a very scary threat to the industry. And I can’t believe how much spam I’m getting. We need to clean everything up or we’ll be hungry. It’s a downward spiral. The only way I can see to do this is by forces from above –- either government intervention or by billing companies or sponsors forcing ethics on their resellers. The resellers are showing us that they really don’t care about the long term and are grabbing the quick cash. That’s not good for the long run.

YNOT: If you had one bit of advice you could offer new webmasters, what would it be?
VirtuMike: If you’re going to do it, do it. Don’t screw around. Do it by the book and play fair. You can’t make a living screwing people over, and we have proof of that. If you do everything clean, you’ll make more in the long run and have fewer headaches. And work with good people.