SOPA, or Stop Online Piracy Act in its full form is an American bill. SOPA is a bill drawn up by the royalty collection agencies in America, its not a brand new idea. Versions of this bill have been put into place

Sinde Law

Sinde Law is seen as the Spanish version of America’s SOPA bill. It gives copyright holders the legal grounds to shutdown websites hosting or linking too illegal material

The detail of Sinde

Before a site can be shutdown, it must be given 10 days notice to remove any illegal material. If the site owner does not respond or cooperate a Spanish judge can order ISPs and other web hosts to stop providing access to said site. This means that ISPs and hosting providers will require a means of blocking portions of the internet according to the wishes of a judge. Of course its not like there’s ever been cases of laws being used outside of their intention..

Anti-terror law misuse in the UK

Spying on ordinary people
London council tracks down charity shop donors using anti-terror bill
Croydon council uses anti-terror act to find who trimmed a tree

All with in the spirit of the law, I’m sure

And of course, who can forget UMG – a huge supporter of SOPA. They have been battling rogue site, MegaUpload for years. Citing them as part of the reason their business is not as profitable as they would like. In 2011 with the support of many big name acts such as Snoop Dog, MegaUpload released a music video on youtube. The response from UMG can be seen here. UMG had it removed, claiming they owned the rights. This was immediatley rubbished by MegaUpload, YouTube and the producers of the video. UMG had no rights to any of the content.

The cloud of digital oppression

Every technological generation copyright and royalty collection agencies shout that the latest advances will destroy the industry. Billions of dollars will be lost, thousands will be put out of work. Artists will stop producing music, studios will stop filming. The 8-Track, cassettes, radio, tv, mp3 players, cd-burners, VHS. All met with the same hysterical claims. Unless we control the technology we are all doomed.

There is a problem with handing control of technology to governments and copyright entities. Technology is not their business or passion. They are not concerned with how good it is, or how useful. If it harms or benefits is not a question for them. They just want to control and make money from it.

The Silver lining, how SOPA and Sinde could save us all

The greatest inventions are ones of need. The internet as it works now has some horrible flaws. Introducing draconian laws like Sinde, publicising the construction of SOPA (a bill that would make the late Kim Jong Il envious) pushes the nerds and geeks into action. It drives the strange techies to figure out ways to work around the obstacles

China has spent billions developing firewalls to isolate it’s citizens from sections of the internet if believes are unsuitable. More and more countries (like the US, UK, France, Spain, Germany, Austrailia .. the list goes on) are taking similar approaches. As people become more aware and more fed up, they find new ways to work around the great firewalls. Dodgy proxies, SSH tunnelling, VPNs.

If you don’t believe me, go to any software house in London. Tell the staff you have added some rule to their internet connection that prevents them from performing a certain action on the internet. Now count how many hours that rule stays viable for. I previously worked for a trading house, they took the decision to block access to Facebook and MySpace. The block was bypassed before the announcement of the measure. With in an hour 15 programmers had decided to stop doing what they were paid to do (costing the company around $5k) just so they could build and deploy a service allowing them and everyone else to regain access to the sites they missed.

If 15 developers can override a block put in place by some very talented computer engineers, how long do we believe a government controlled block will last. How long did China’s last? How long has Iran’s lasted?

SOPA will be DOA

By the time SOPA arrives and I firmly believe it will, it won’t be fit for purpose. It’ll likely do more damage to any technology company that tries to comply with it, than to companies that try to work around it.

The end result will be people move away from traditional media at an even faster rate, only this time they’ll start to depart from large corporate entities such as Google and Facebook. Companies who while opposing SOPA are in a position that when it becomes law they will be forced to comply with its demands. Opening a gap for someone with less political worries and no share holders to answer.

Look at the porn industry

Porn, it’s a dirty word that people don’t want to be associated with. Getting caught in the net of porn is enough to scare people away from any business dealings with it. Shops don’t want people selling porn near by and most sites don’t want to stock pornographic material. What’s the end result?

The online porn industry booms, cutting out the middle man. Street retailers suffer from poor christmas spending and financial constraints. Local governments increase property taxes, building owners push up rents. Meanwhile a porn industry that’s been forced of the streets and into the once virgin world of the internet has established a powerful base. Learning all the lessons of the environment they have done what the music, film and games industry is constantly resisting. They adapted to change times, environment and consumers

The Mayan calendar predicts a change in 2012, I think this will be the year that the film and music industry as we know it signs its own death warrant

Bachelor of sex?

I previously posted an article tackling the issue of why students in England should reconsider becoming prostitution as a means of paying for their education. Part way through that post I suggested that it may be in their interests to spend some time effectively whoring themselves out for money.

Let’s be clear on a few things before we go any further

1. By student, I mean a well rounded higher education level student over the age of 18
2. I am in no way suggesting this is for everyone
3. I am not trying to pressure or coerce anyone one into joining the sex industry (or any kind of working environment)
4. This is entirely tongue in cheek

Let’s begin…

1. Campus students live in a bubble. The effects are less for city students, like those studying in London, but still there experience of different social groups will be limited. Getting students to spend a bit of time escorting will give them the chance to experience what it’s like having to spend time making idle chit chat and banter with someone you at best couldn’t give a fuck about and at worst flat out detest. All the while smiling and pretending to be very ingested in the narcissistic shit that dribbles out of their mouths. Welcome to the world of full-time employment, in today’s society where so many kids are used to being able to turn off
2. Yes, an end to asking mommy and daddy or the bank or their rich mates to loan them money for bus fare. Why ? Well first of all they’ll realise that their parents aren’t going to give them money so they can go and shag some stranger… or anyone to be honest. Secondly they’ll quickly realise that they need to invest in themselves and their jobs not their alcohol consumption, if they want to earn more money
3. I think that spending some time as an escort will help students understand why its important to be punctual. A quick lesson of turning up 30 minutes late too a booking and then realising this results in them being £100 short, i reckon they’ll soon learn that if they want that trendy new vintage coat any time before it goes out of fashion (then back in and then out again) they’ll have to get a grip of their tardiness!
4. Student escorts would learn to grow a thick skin, weather its from rude punters, judging society or dodgy agencies. They’ll realise they have to fight their own battles. Running home to daddy and telling him that some freak wants to smear poop all over you and then masturbate despite you saying you don’t want to mess up your new carpet isn’t going to be top on your list of solutions. Sure he’ll help, but he’ll never look at you in the same way. So you will have no choice to be to tell that persistant nutter to take his oddity to some other escort that doesn’t mind getting a grubby rug.
5. They’ll realise that life is a lot easier and more forgiving if you are pro-active. They’ll soon realise that sitting back expecting the phone to be ringing off the hook with client bookings won’t get them anywhere. Neither will sulking over a bad punter review – sulking never gets anyone anywhere. Becoming an escort will prepare them for a life of making shit happen for themselves, weather its finding clients, a new place to do incalls from or getting rid of that wierdo stalker. Spending a stint as a sex worker also might teach students about personal responsibility, young adults expect everything to be done for them these days. They want a job, get a person to find them a job, they want some money borrow it from a bank, they drink too much – blame the bar. No. Being a sex worker will teach them that they are responsible for their own fortunes. Working or not working, that’s down to them!

Sex, study ....... profit?

There’s been a bit of a hoo haa in the news about the amount of English students turning to escorting and other jobs in the sex industry to fund their studies. There’s a whole attitude of shame on the sex industry and the people who use it. I think it’s partly to avoid the issue of asking why are students in a position were they are trying to better themselves, but unable to do so because of financial restrictions.

Anyway, for any of you lovely students thinking of doing a spot of escorting here are a couple of reasons as to why you should re-consider your journey into hot steamy adult world of non-stop paid sex with amazingly attractive, rich well spoken people.

1. As an escort you don’t always get to pick and choose your clients (punters). More to the point, unlike most businesses where you can get rid of or refuse to deal with an asshole customer on the basis of them being an asshole, and people understanding. As an escort things don’t quite work like this – first of all in society you are pretty low down. Lower than most assholes, so you’ll find sympathy in short supply. Secondly not all escorts are equal. Some escorts (your competition will have been working for years to build up huge client lists and so have the luxury of turning someone away for being a prick. You as a newbie do not have this luxury. You take what you can get!
2. Its not like ‘Secret Diary Of A Call Girl’, the hours are erratic, they will interfere with your studies, drinking, episodes of Dexter (or whatever it is that uni students are watching these days). Bottom line is that being an escort is hard work – in the UK at least. To be honest there is an argument to be made that every English university student should become an Escort for at least one term. Just so they get a taste of what real work is like… you know, having to be places on time, keeping track of expenses, dealing with an obnoxious wanker, learning to not hate yourself even if everyone else does…. all the usual full-time day to day work related issues.
3. A big part of going to university is socialising and another big part is learning to socialise with people outside of your normal social groups. Socialising does not mean Facebook and Twitter. This is real (sometimes forced) inter-action with people you’d otherwise avoid in the street. If you are doing something that isn’t 100% socially acceptable like say… having sex with people for money, this is going to inevitably result in some awkward situations of trying to explain what you were up to last night… ‘my fist in the lecture’s arse’ is not going to get a nod of approval from too many people. If there is one thing that can polarise a group of people and bring out those hidden puritanical values its the subject of sex for money or enjoyment. Sex for anything other than procreation of social conformity is frowned upon in many western civilisations
4. If anyone finds out, everyone on campus will find out. Throw in MyBook and Facespace and every future employer will know. Suddenly this part-time job that you were doing just to avoid books / jagerbombs will become your life time job, unless you decide to change your name and dump all your old friends
5. Clients and “Agents” will think that because you are a student they can take the piss. From unreasonable demands to unreasonable fees. Your youthful exuberance will be set upon by a pack of hyenas with opposable thumbs who’ve just found an abandoned limping calf. Checkout http://www.saafe.info/ to get an example of the sort of dodgy underhanded shit your customers and your “business partners” will attempt to try.

International day to end violence against sex workers - 17th Decemeber

International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers is held on December 17th every year.

Supported by escorts, porn professionals, clients, friends and families this day has been celebrated since 2003. It began with Dr. Annie Sprinkle who works for the American sex works rights group, Sex Workers Outreach Project USA.

International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers began as a memorial for the victims of Gary Ridgway who murdered over 70 prostitutes and run aways in the 1980s and 1990s. This memorial has since grown into an international day used to show solidarity in the fight against hate crimes and discrimination of sex workers.

The red umbrella has been adopted as the logo of Sex Workers Rights since Venetian sex workers held an anti-violence protest march a year earlier.

1. Use clear and authentic pictures: These days everyone is aware of Photoshop, if you are digitally altering your photographs people will smell a rat. If you are using fake photographs you are going to have unhappy clients and word will spread that you are running a bait-n-switch scam
2. In your pictures wear different clothes: Clients have varying tastes so by showing yourself in different styles of outfits you’ll increase the audience that you appeal too
3. Pay attention to your spelling and grammar: It’s hard to take someone seriously if they don’t have a good command of the English (or chosen) language. In the escorting business, good communication is essential and if you can’t communicate properly in the controlled environment of your adverts clients will expect to struggle face to face
4. Write something interesting about yourself: Clients know why they want a visit an escort, you need to give a reason for a client to book you instead of any other escort.
5. Keep your adverts up to date: On sites like Adultwork many clients list escorts by who has updated their profile most recently. You want to be at the top of this list so update very frequently. Search engines will rank pages higher if they belong to sites which frequently update.
6. Make sure you can be contacted: Provide a direct telephone or email address so clients know how they can get a hold of you. If you have an agent, make sure this information is visible to any potential clients so they understand the first person they speak to may not be you. A lot of escorts bury contact information because they don’t want to be bombarded by nuisance messages, unfortunately there are many idiots out there so it would be best to find a screening method that does not punish legitimate clients
7. Price reasonably and fairly to yourself: Don’t sell yourself short, you’ll look dodgy. Don’t over price yourself you’ll drive away customers. Look at the market around yourself, the services your offer and then adjust for your own costs.
8. Get a website: This will make you appear more legitimate and committed. It also helps you to control how people communicate with you and what they see about you

Continued strong global Internet usage growth, along with increasingly powerful distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks leveled against all parts of the Internet’s critical infrastructure, have dramatically increased the demands on Internet infrastructure providers such as Verisign. In the last five years, the volume of Domain Name System (DNS) queries on Verisign’s global Internet infrastructure has more than doubled, increasing to an average daily query load of 57 billion in the first quarter of 2011. Future growth is expected to occur at an even faster pace. Verisign’s infrastructure has maintained 100 percent operational security, accuracy and stability for more than a decade due to continued innovation and investment in the infrastructure.

As of January 15th of 2012, the cost of registering a .com and .net domain name will be rising $0.51 (about 33 pence), we expect that some domain registars will take this as an opportunity to increase their pricing. How does this effect you? Read at Xchangebit (http://www.xchangebit.com/blog/domain-prices-to-rise-verisig-press-release)

• Music or videos that play automatically
• A sexy flash introduction
• Large un-optimised pictures
• 3rd party plugins loaded at the top of the page/li>
• Contact / sale action not on the home page

If your website has any of these characteristics then you are probably upsetting some of potential clients. These characteristics of sites that prevent sales with unhelpful design.

Changes you could make are

• Don’t auto play videos and music, a lot of escort clients are trying to keep their recreation a quiet hobby. Sudden loud sounds is going to send them rushing for the back button..
• Sexy flash videos unless there is an easy obvious way to skip them are a major headache for users. Also, would you rather give your clients 10 seconds to be interrupted or get the straight to the booking stage.
• If your site is slow at loading pictures, your customer will leave
• Because of the way 3rd party plugins like google analytics are loaded they can disable your entire site if the supplier of the plugin has any form of technical difficulty. However, loading plugins last (at the end of your page) can reduce the damage done
• Don’t make your clients hunt for a way to contact you, they may well have found you else where and now just want a number or email address. Make it easy for people to book you, make the booking the centre of attention of your site. For ideas how, just google ‘call to action’.in the future I’ll put some examples of great calls to action, used by the big boys.

Our SEO skills will get you in the top 5 of Google

Smell familiar, yes my friends that is the smell of bullshit. There are three things you should commit part of your budge to SEO.

1. Anyone can be an SEO guru. Being able to do SEO doesn’t mean you should do SEO. It (like web development) is unregulated. But unlike most unregulated markets theres no amount of training or certification available.
2. Google decides who goes number one, two, three etc. This changes based on complex mathematical logic powered by millions of dollars worth of investment, is your £/$150 a month to a slick haired chap going to beat that?
3. Google is not the only search engine in the world, certainly not when you consider that most business communities are now global. Take a London / New York / Berlin based business, surrounding these businesses will be people from all over the world, they may not (probably will not) all speak the same language or share the same social thinking. SEO packages aren’t catering for these, they don’t care. They will try and rank you in one very tiny specific vertical, how much is that vertical worth?

Our SEO techniques will get you on the first page of Google

It’s important to remember that SEO is not concerned with your business generating a profit, its not client focused.

The issue SEO pedlars are desperate for you to ignore, ROI. If you spend £150 a month on SEO – will that investment lead to £1800 worth of extra sales and appointments. Will it beat that target by enough to warrant the time spent researching and monitoring your SEO efforts?

Our SEO ninja voodoo priests will put you number 1 on Google

The bottom line for most businesses (maybe not the terrible ones) is to make a profit. SEO does not concern itself with this. SEO is just concerned with a being at the top of a list. If you fall from your chosen position, well you just have to pay more to get back, or pay to stay there.

Two final thoughts on SEO

1. Don’t pay for it, put your money on a horse, you’ll get a better ROI
2. Video yourself putting a cat in a bin, then upload it to youtube. You’ll get some pretty amazing SEO results then

Escorts, agencies and adult directories in London are paying thousands of pounds a month for SEO packages, for activities that generate no noticeable improvement in sales. It’s time we start reviewing what we pay for and how we sell. There are bitter fights for the top spots on Google with people spending all day and silly amounts of money generating content that is useless to customers and business clients and discourage sales.

Like the article suggests, people running a business need to start thinking about their investments of time, effort and money. Do you want to have the most top positions on the internet, or the most money

How do I get a website for escorting?

If you are on a budget (or don’t have one) there are plenty of free offerings around. But in the world of money for services, you need to ask ‘am I getting what I am paying for’, because you know for sure your clients will.

Lets look at why, as an escort should buy your hosting from a pro’ who can give you a customised professional experience instead of going down the road of freebies.

1. Paid hosting offer better support and they are motivated to keep on supporting you
2. You control any and all advertising that appears on your site
3. More freedom about what you can do with your site
4. A dedicated company or professional individual (even better) can focus on your site, your market and almost act as a PA to our online business. Helping you respond to the changing digital landscape
5. Pro’s offering a more personalised serviced understand that making the next sale for you is important, you become more than just another customer invoice number. Their success is tied to your success as an escort.

Like in the world of escorting, when you want a website you get what you pay for.

So you want to do incalls but not to your home? Or have you decided to become a touring escort, maybe you want to book an escort for an outcall, but can’t bring her back home

You’ll need to get yourself a temporary pad! Hotels are great, everything is done for you, two problems with hotels in London

1. Price: to pay for one night in a London hotel, you’ll need two or three clients or to be a VIP (expensive) escort
2. Privacy: This is your clients perception, naturally they are more likely to be nervous about who sees them going in and out of a hotel compared to yourself, a professional escort who is either used to this or just doesn’t give a damn.
3. Lots of neighbours: Not that it’s anyones business if you are escorting or selling socks but you and your clients may find your bookings less intimate if they are to the soundtrack of families running around all day
4. Location: We all know that having the right location can be make or break for an escort, as well as effect the quality of your clients. Some hotels are built to as a place for travellers to pass through. Not so great for your escorting business when you consider the three points above!

So lets look at the obvious alternative, get yourself a serviced apartment, the lushness of a hotel but for half the price and twice the privacy. Perfect for those escorting adventures in London.

1. Fair priced: As a modestly priced escort you could manage off one client a day, or if you considered yourself to be more of a VIP escort perhaps one client every other day
2. Privacy: Its the benefits of having your own flat but without having to deal with the annoyance of landlords, long term contracts, managing utilities. All the stuff that isn’t being an escort but eats time and money
3. Neighbours: People using serviced apartments are generally doing so because they don’t want the annoying parts of hotels.. e.g. Neighbours. Great if you want to provide a tailored escort service in a controlled environment without any children’s laughter in the background to run the moment
4. Location: All the serviced apartments listed are found near transport hubs, some near hotels so clients visiting london can hop over from their own hotel. Also they are centrally located so getting some extra supplies for that big client won’t be a big issue

5 Serviced apartments for escorting in London

• 196 Bishopsgate

  This is within walking distance from Liverpool Street Station and Moorgate station, so your immediate client catchment area is going to most of Central London and inner East London. In addition, if someone is looking for an outcall escort you have rail links to Stansted airport and most of Essex. Food and most domestic supplies can be found in and around Bricklane (about 20 minutes walk).

• Credible Apartments

  This located in Croydon, perfect for South East London escorts (or if you don’t want to work in your own backyard). Excellent links to most major London airports so outcall escorting is a viable options here. Its a pretty modern four star block of studio, 1/2/3 bed and loft apartments

• Citadines – London, South Kensington

  Posh location or what? Well for those of us that know South Kensington, its not all that but for tourists and some of the locals it’s still a bit magical. The downside is you are going to be surrounded by other escorts. The upside is, when it comes to review time clients are not only going to be impressed by their time with you but they’ll love their surroundings. The apartments are spacious and easy to relax in a huge improvement over the dingy pokey flats of many other Kensington based escort

• Marlin Apartments – London, Stratford

  Well with 2012 coming up, what is more to say. Situated perfectly for the thousands of extra potential clients. This could be seen as a bit of an escorting windfall a few weeks here in 2012 and you could spend the following six months being the most relaxed carefree escort in London. These apartments are wonderfully furnished, easy to get too and of course supported by Westfields shopping centre with its casino (more clients!) so no need to worry about running out of food or supplies.

• Hyde Park Executive Apartments

  A great option, especially if you are an independent looking to compete with or make yourself more attractive to escort agencies. Also if you are with an agency and looking to make an easy transition out with a bit of a revamp. You’ve got Hyde Park and Bayswater tube stations near by and a whole swathe of hotels that you can be running outcalls too and pulling clients in from. In addition for those quieter nights you aren’t too far away from the London nightlife or late night shopping in the West End