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ADULT WEBMASTERS -- JACK OF ALL TRADES?
by CDSmith
ADULT WEBMASTERS -- JACK OF ALL TRADES?
Okay, so you want to get started in the adult webmastering business, right? Great! But upon looking over all the areas of running a successful website that comes into play for most webmasters, the task can seem insurmountable. I mean, you've got to know something about web design, graphics design, photography, site promotion, advertising & writing ad copy, your writing skills need to be very good, you need some business sense, some artistic ability would help, and a ton of other skills too. When considering running an adult porn site, all these things come into play, or...do they?
Thinking back here, the first problem I had was that I didn't know any html, or even what html stood for. I got my start from my boss at the ISP (Internet Service Provider) that I worked for. I was working there selling high-speed internet access to businesses, and while there I took the opportunity to watch the in-house webmaster work his magic. I was immediately fascinated by the amazing pages he created daily for other businesses. So! I got myself a home computer, and began teaching myself html and how to use an html editor. The programs I chose to use were textpad and also Netscape Composer, and to this day I still use these same two programs for building my pages. Other webmasters will tell you the programs they use and love, and that's fine. You should stick with the programs you are comfortable with for getting the job done. I started by building a personal home "hobby" site, that included pics of my dog and me, it had a guestbook, and some creative writings of my own, mostly about my past, my interest in cooking, my former girlfriends (got some hits over that), and I learned all the basics with this site. For the basic html I did searches at yahoo.com and altavista.com for "free html tutorial" and "free java scripts" and found dozens of helpful sites. I poured through those pages and learned each and every technique/script that interested me. I still go back to those sites when I need a new type of script or coding method.
I soon started my first free site, a model's portfolio site called "CD's Models on the Web." Since I had no photo content of my own, and being mindful of copyrighted images and their illegal use, I began surfing the net for model's websites. Upon finding their email addresses I would email them and ask them if they wanted a free portfolio listing on my site in exchange for a link to their site. I asked the models to email me several of their pictures and their site banners, and I made them free pages to promote them. Pretty good deal, right? The model gets free ongoing promotion and traffic, and I get free content for my site, right? Well, I did have some success, and I eventually built up that site to over 1500 photos of over 120 net-models, but I was accused of spamming more than a few times. I wouldn't recommend bothering too many models that way these days. But that's how I got started. I'm not saying that you should do it this way, I'm only telling you this to give you an idea of the possibilities. There are literally thousands upon thousands of companies out there that will either sell you cd's full of any type of pictures you need for your sites, or they will give you permission to use their pictures if you agree to promote their sites. Join any affiliate program for adult paysites and you'll likely have more free content than you know what to do with, and you'll make money too. (that's the whole idea, right?)
As for the rest of the skills I mentioned, they took me another 2 years to develop to any real marketable degree, but it was worth it. Practise editing images and creating graphics. Get a good image editor like Paint Shop Pro 7 or Adobe Photoshop etc, and learn to use it. Check the "help" index in the program to learn how to do all the cool f/x you see out there in images. Again, and I can't stress this enough.... always be mindful of the copyrights of the work of others. Just because you've changed the look of a picture doesn't give you the right to display it publicly. You must either use pictures you have produced yourself from your own camera, or you can use content on loan from other websites (affiliate programs), or you can use content that you've purchased from a provider, in which case you would possess a "limited use licensing agreement" signed by the company and yourself. The days of downloading pics off the net and making a website out of them are long gone.
So by now you can see that in order to be a successful webmaster it seems like you need to be a "jack of all trades" to some degree. Don't let this stop you from taking the first steps. The ongoing rewards from running a successful adult paysite or a network of avs or free sites far outweigh the time and effort that is needed to develop the necessary skills. Not to mention the fact that much of the "work" is fun and interesting and hardly as tedious as a 9-to-5 job working for someone else.
Stay tuned for part 2.
CD Smith
Babe Galleries Network (TGP): http://www4.smutserver.com/babes/bgnetwork/main.html
CD's Models on the Web http://www.cdsmodels.com/
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