how was your 2010?

its coming to the end of the year, so it only seems appropriate to look back and evaluate how the year went.

It was a rough year for our industry. We started out with some serious bad news in world economics, with banks failing and countries needing to be bailed out. Then summer hit our industry where it hurt, with the closure of some big programs like Python and WegCash, while others just stopped paying like the SOBV family and Hot House, and some even closed and reopened like EuroRevenue. And of course, ePassporte's failure and WebmasterCheck's DOJ seizure caused a huge ripple in payouts, and we are still waiting for fund releases from both of these places.

But the good news seems to be that those who weathered through the summer of hell are reporting sales increasing in Oct and Nov, and there seems to be a bit of optimism that the worse is behind us.

Personally, its been a year of acquisitions for me, starting with BritishBucks and LatinoBucks (formerly AlexanderBucks), and ending with GayWideWebmasters. We also ventured into the mobile market with 9 gay mobile sites under the HunkMoney program. And of course, we released 4 new sites and a whole new affiliate site under LatinoBucks. So, although the year could have been a lot better, I am still quite happy with the way things progressed, all things considering!

So what about you? How did you fair? Share your most notable events of 2010!

I, personally, can not complain... Everything was rather steady instead of going down...

Let's cross fingers for 2011 for me, PLEASE - I really need it.

DEV

For me it was a year where traffic went up nicely (50% on rawtop.com and 90% overall), but unfortunately income didn't go up at the same rate. That part is a bit frustrating actually... But then again part of my growth was launching a forum site, which I knew wouldn't be anywhere near as profitable on a per-visit basis... My other big experiment was a Spanish porn blog which I also knew wouldn't be terribly profitable. Even with all that income is below where I would have expected it to be.

This year was our best year yet. Woohoo! I'm excited for 2011 as I think it is going to get even better.

Jimmy

I can not complain about this year, but i still hope that the next year will be even better:)

Luke, one of the sadder negatives about 2010 was CraigsList banning adult talent ads in the US.

As a studio and webmaster, I have about 30 revenue sources. When one goes down, another steps in and takes its place, either thru new products, traffic, or consumer ebb and flow.

I added 3 mew VOD partners, as 1 older VOD partner really slipped, while 1 newer/older VOD partner changed its practices and revenue shot way up.

This year I was able to add eBooks as a method of selling my photo books. Kindle and Barned & Noble Nook. Then Kindle added a specific UK store in the Fall (for UK customers to use GBP without exchange fees and ratios).

Together, that offset a major decline in one of my VOD partners, who had been offering a weekly/biweekly/monthly membership pass in 2009.

This weekend, Google launched their Book selling program, linking searches to my own site's selling page, as well as rev share downloads thru Google Books.

While 2010 will be slightly down from 2009 (because of that one VOD partner who did very well in 2009), it is still up from 2008. I did not do as many shoots, and did not create as much new content as in 2006-2009, so my bank account balance is up.

I suspect 2011 will be better. The awful US election is over. Wall St bought the election, claiming Democrats would hurt them. So now that they won, the spotlight will be on them to fulfill their promises of creating jobs and loaning money. It already is, as the media is reporting the truth, that US businesses are and have been sitting on $2 Trillion in cash for most of the year, and the transition doesn't happen for another month.

Soon, I want to start my United Kingdom adventure, and go to London to shoot with models there. CraigsList has not banned adult ads there. My 2010 birthday put me closer to "retirement" age. Since I will never be able to retire financially, I want to 'retire" to a different physical locale, while the Internet can keep me in touch with my US and Europe Friends, and customer base.

It's been a fantastic year for me I hope it carries on like this next year.

I can not complain this year, but less than years ago sure.