Content Producers - How Do You Feel About Scouting On MySpace Etc?

When it comes to picking up new models, what are your thoughts about scouting them on social networks like MySpace, Facebook, LifeOut, etc, etc?

I mean im almost certain it would be a great source to find models but at the same time, how do you know the people you are actually messaging *are* over the age of 18?

Do any of you actually scout models on social networks and if so, how do you go about verifying their ages? I mean surely the 'first contact' would be enough for you to be breaking the law if you are simply asking their age with the intent of contacting them for 'adult' work?

Regards,

Lee

I know of at least one producer (not counting the deceased Bryan Kocis) who is fairly open about the fact that he trolls Myspace for 16 and 17 year old boys and basically chats them up and essentially "grooms" them so that literally as soon as they turn 18, he's got them on a plane and shooting content for him.

Illegal as hell, and wildly unethical, but nobody seems to want to do anything about it.

Honestly, with any sort of online recruiting, the very first question should be to ask if the person is really 18 or not, and if not, to simply not communicate about anything even remotely associated with sex, adult content, or anything of the sort.

With our first-time fly-in models, we use a pretty detailed contract, the first part of which has language to the effect that if they have misrepresented their age, Armageddon will occur and all hell will break loose and they will be very, very unhappy that they've lied. Once or twice, after the contract was sent, the model stopped responding, and I have always wondered if it was because they were underage and got scared. But between that and the other age verification methods we use, we're confident that by the time a model shows up, they are of legal age.

I've used a variety of social networking sites to arrange for shoots.

As we discussed a couple of weeks ago, I have them e-mail a jpg of their ID/DL before they show up, or before the conversation gets too hot. But then, I go more for the 21-30 age range.

I personally find myspace great for the older niche and pornstars. It is a marketing tool for us more so than a recruiting tool. On occasion I will get someone young hit me up about doing video but typically he has already worked for other studios or is already familiar with my work.

We do a fair amount of our recruiting by word of mouth and marketing in the community. The boys naturally come to us when they want work once they know we exist. Referrals are our best friend! :bananacock:

The adult chat sites we work are all 18 plus so we assume they are of age and they have verified to the site they are of age so you are able to chat about adult subjects without breaking the law. However questionable models must always provide us 2 ID before flying them in for work from somewhere else.

We had a discussion about that today during a meeting because of a 2257 issue we had with a company that wanted to license some of our straight content for broadcast (the issue was clerical "styles").
Someone brought up the Traci Lords thing and it turns out since she had used a fake ID the producers weren't technically at fault since she was actually committing fraud. It would still mean yanking the content, but legal ramifications aren't as catastrophic as one might think. That being said, turning a blind eye to an obviously fake ID or telling someone underage how to get a good fake ID would be a whole other ball game.

I thought it was only illegal to photograph or film someone under 18 in the nude. Why is it illegal to just chat with someone under 18 about doing porn, as long as you make it clear you won't work with them until they turn 18?

MySpace has been great for us. Not only as a recruiting tool, but it's great for branding and marketing, and a good way to keep in touch with models, since they're constantly changing phone numbers or email addresses. They keep their MySpace accounts, by god! And it's classier than Craigslist.

Having said that, we do "passive" recruiting only. We don't approach people. Rather, we've constructed a really interesting and fun profile that funnels potential models to our website, where they apply formally.

I've had a profile online for a few years. I update it regularly, and I spend a fair amount of time doing so. I think if you do it well, it'll work. But just having a presence there without putting time into it... well, I see some studios who do that and it looks pretty lame.

www.myspace.com/maleimage

I notice your profile is set to private. What's the logic behind that? It seems like you'd get more visits if it could be seen by anyone.

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Originally Posted by msm

I notice your profile is set to private. What's the logic behind that? It seems like you'd get more visits if it could be seen by anyone.

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If you have an open profile, you can't see who's looking. By making them send you an Add Request, you know who's interested in seeing it, and that gives you a chance to separate out the real hotties and send them a friendly "hello" or other conversation starter. That's my logic; it works for me.

In my country situation is quite easy. First I ask model what day he was born.
Then (a couple of emails/days later) I ask him for his citizen's N#. This is an 11 digit number (as SSN in USA). It has specific format like: YYMMDD###SV, where YY = year, MM = month, DD = day of birth, ###S = this day birth counter (pair for girls, impair for boys), V = verification digit. The Pesel number (this is how it's called) is unique for 500 years. No two citizens have the same. It is very unlikely to construct a valid Pesel number with correct verification digit if model cheated with his birthday.
And the first thing I check when we finally meet "live" is his ID with Pesel number.