Legislation Which Could Affect All Adult Webmasters
You will have seen me complaining in the past on Make Money Market Porn about the assumption by some US adult webmasters that my porn blogs, including those not using content from US sponsors, should adhere to all US legislation because they will be viewed by US surfers.
I won’t go into that argument again here, because (a) When I market porn I try to ensure that it does adhere to the principal of 2257 regulations anyhow. This is not because I think that we should all buckle under to ‘the US way’, but because I am a moral person who agrees that underage sex should never be promoted when you make money selling porn and (b) most of my sponsors, whether I like it or not, come from the US and, as they have to adhere to 2257 legislation, then in marketing their porn, they obviously expect me to do so too.
But recently another piece of legislation has been passed and this time, not from the US, but from the UK (similar laws were passed in the EU in January, but this one is even stricter in content). And this could affect all webmasters, adult and mainstream, in the same way that 2257 affects us all.
The New Legislation:
The Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008 Law came into force on May 28th this year. (That was a link to the PDF file).
If you look at Andy Beard’s recent discussion of this and the comments on the post, you will see that this law not only affects those living and trading in the UK, but could also affect anyone hoping to sell products in the UK, either as a seller, a promoter, or as an affiliate to either.
And the reason why this new legislation does this is that it expects full disclosure if we are making money on the internet, from any source. If you live in the UK (and to a lesser extent the EU), you will be expected to post all details about yourself and your commercial interests. Gone are the days when you could trade under a pseudonym to protect yourself, not only from spammers, but from those who have no right to that knowledge in the first place and could even do you or your company harm if they found out.
The argument in the legislation is that this is to prevent people making money by pretending to be someone else or posting spurious claims or false ‘closing dates’ on products. But it opens up much wider possibilites for anyone wanting to control commercial ventures on the internet than this.
If you live in the UK, look at this post from Payment Blogger which explains how you should be declaring yourself and your commercial interests on your blog or site. No anonimity is allowed, even if for your safety and peace of mind, full disclosure is necessary.
And if you are a UK or EU citizen and you think you can still get away with all this by using a proxy at all times and a fake address, check this out: How to blog anonymously. It’s not good news either…
Of course, the new legislation does not directly apply to webmasters, adult or otherwise, living and working in the US, but they could be applied if you ever intend to visit the UK. After all, as US webmasters have been quick to point out regarding 2257 regulations, if you market porn on the web, you cannot control your audience, therefore those who purchase sex site membership through your affiliate link could be living anywhere in the world…
So, if you are a US adult or mainstream webmaster and you want to visit the UK for a holiday, after you have made your money selling porn, you might just want to consider the above legislation and how it could apply to you.
Either way, all this legislation, US, UK or EU, puts even more pressure on anyone trying to make money on the internet, whether they market porn or simply want to sell a stupid ebook. So who does it benefit?
At the end of the day I think it benefits no one, particularly those the legislation is supposedly trying to protect. All it does is tie all of us trying to earn an honest living into even more knots and affects our ability to remain private and feel safe with our legitimate business interests. Personally, I feel it is more of the same old thing, trying to control how everyone does business and keeping more tabs on us. Of course not everyone may agree on that…
When you want to make money legitimately selling porn on the internet, your life is not your own any more. Not that it ever was…
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I’m a wannabe webmaster with a dozen ideas for different websites, a couple of those porn related.
I have had the idea of starting a blog much like this where I would write about my online ventures and was debating with myself if I should disclose that I was into porn marketing or keep it a secret. In light of these new laws that is no longer an option. I feel this is similar to denying writers of non-adult literature the chance to write erotic material on the side under an alias.