What is it about this business?

The adult business seems to attract more that it's fair share of scammers and snake oil salesmen.

Two weeks ago, some Japanese site hot linked a bunch of my preview pictures. Last week, I find out that someone I was trying to work a deal with to promote one another's sites is trying to scam traffic from me through some hidden link BS.

At MANcheck, we get hundreds of sites submitted every day that are created for the sole purpose of stealing our traffic. Hence, we have a TOS as long as your arm covering off every scam known to mankind. Everybody else does, too.

Some TGP owner wrote here the other day that he gets spammed every day with 100 submissions from the same guy. Another TGP submitter doesn't like sharing her work here because people have stolen it, used it, and got her into hot water.

TGP owners have to threaten you with lifetime bans and inclusions in databases just to get you to play nicely.

In January, Titan Media sent out 200,000 cease and desist notices to people illegally using their content.

So what is it about this business that it attracts the seedier side of the planet? Why are so many out to just make a quick buck?

How do we protect GWW, a refuge in a big way, from this? How do we support one another? How do we find more people like ourselves?

How do we get the industry to move forward and away from this kind of behaviour?

It's not all that difficult. I reached out to Bec once and gave her some unsolicited advice. She thanked me. I share my URL. She gave me some advice that double my sales (Thanks again, girl!) I asked her for help with my first TGP submission. She spent half an hour on the phone one night helping me. I helped her a couple of months later with search engine stuff.

I put Juicy Goo as a recip on TGPs. Brian thanked me and asked me to send him a banner for my site so he could put it on his.

I won $50 in content in the last small contest. When I got the content, I e-mailed the provider and thanked them. She e-mailed me back almost flabberghasted that I bothered to thank her.

What's up? What's so hard about being on the level, being kind to one another, not screwing one another to make a buck?

Looking forward to hearing what y'all have to say.

Dzinerbear

How well do I know this. I keep getting people trying to steal my feeds for their site. Not only do the try to steal the stream itself, but all the graphics, name ect.

There was this one site I found in Europe that had not only my stuff, but almost every live streaming site out there, and was just giving it away. It's so funny how it's ok for them to steal from you (us), but if they find someone stealing from their site they want to sue, or start posting things about the site.

I'm sorry but I can't do business with a company that I don't trust.

Unfortunately - this is very true... I think that because of the perceived anonymity of the industry, people feel safer scamming others... because people don't always get to meet face-to-face over a drink and a handshake, they can sleep at night after stabbing someone in the back... and I agree - what has happened to common courtesy? Back "in the day" webmasters were much more friendly - it was much more of a community feeling on ALL boards, not just in refuges like GWW.

When I think about all the BS that goes on I get angry, but then I remember that I have surrounded myself with good, honest, hard-working folks in this industry and have distanced myself from the cheaters... I have been SO fortunate to have met so many amazing people over the years and it is THOSE PEOPLE that keep me here. If not for those wonderful few, the wicked masses would have scared me off long ago.

THANK YOU Gary-Alan for working tirelessly over the years to provide such a welcoming, friendly community for webmasters to meet, do business and get to know one another.

Oh and don't forget - KARMA will eventually bite those a--holes in the end... sometimes it takes awhile, but it DOES come around! ;)

lol titan media are some of the worst. dont even get me started on them.

Hey Michael -- you're more than welcome to any help I can give, and I'm glad my suggestions improved the site sales ... and sometimes talking on the phone helps to clear up WHY you do something a certain way- and it's a hell of alot faster than trying to IM some concepts!

I like to try to give the benefit of the doubt to those that I meet and do business with, but sometimes you do stuff for someone and you aren't given a fair shake ... it's happened to me already, and even by folk that frequent this board ... so its not the total haven we'd like it to be, but damn close.

We can do what we can to help one another, we can try to protect our sites and our content, but the internet by its very nature pretty much prevents an absolute secure solution. I'm often asked about writings that go up on my lesbian literature website ... are they copywrite protected ... and I bite my tongue and send back a polite note saying that they own the copywrite but that I can't protect their work from being copied and distrubuted. It's up there for the world to see, and abuse, pretty much any way they choose.

Unfortunately, if someone sees a way to exploit and gain via the net -- and that just isn't about content, but about adults and kids too, they'll do it.

Ok, so i've been conspicuously absent for a couple of days but having just digested this post I have to make comment.

I would still call myself a relatively new webmaster and will always see it that way because I am always learning something new.

The people that I've met and worked with on GWW have been nothing but helpful, understanding and at times tutours.

I have basically given up posting on other boards due to their lack of community feel and the lack of trust that I have for completely unknown business people but I am sure that the people who are regulars that post here are in it for the long haul to be honest open and reliable. So what more can I say but thankyou for your help, thankyou to Gary, Lee and Chris and most of all all the community members who have made my experience to date fantastic.

Cheers,

Allan

awwww, Allan! Your so sweet sometimes! (Take me now!)I feel the same way, but I have to talk to those other "people". ;)

I've been burned by hosts, cc processors, avs's, tgp's, you name it. It all comes down to the bottom line. And what is easy. If it's easier to rip someone off than work your way to the top, there will always be people willing to take advantage of that. I'm sure a lot of the really awful people in this biz got their first taste of easy scams during the boom when anyone and everyone would practicly throw money at them to start something.

The content leeches have always been a problem, and probably always will be. I'm guilty of using those "public domain" pics that get people so worked up, but I learned my lesson, and I definately have never, ever hotlinked. To me thats like someone blowing a hole in the side of a movie theatre and then standing there trying to sell tickets.

I think the best way to fight it is just to report illegal activity, stay educated and informed on what is going on, and make sure you have a detailed stats script on all your sites so you know where your traffic is comming from and going. Other than that, sites like this help everyone make connections, trade horror stories so everyone knows who to avoid, and overall just learn from each others success and mistakes.

I agree with Ozmg though that communities like this are RARE, most i've found are about asking questions without offering anyone else advice, and stupid witch hunts (yeah i've heard of that guy/girl..somewhere, let's get him/her!) This is truely a unique and special resource!

Its a way of life these days it seems, people have forgotten the values despite all the rhetoric.

Online scams happen I think because they prey on people's greed because we are inundated with the need for more money, more toys and more wealth instead of measuring true wealth with honest friendships & relationships.

This place along with one or two others offers more and you can't really protect it per se, but i think as long as people continue to strive for honest relationships, working or otherwise, then these places can survive and can become a safe haven for those willing to put aside the greed, laziness that exists.

People forget how two simple words like 'thank you' can make a difference for another. so to GWW, thank you, this is a great place to hang.

Ian

Thanks everyone for your thoughts and feedback on this.

I understand now why this was such a tough crowd to break into. The board was friendly enough when I first joined, but it was really about 5-6 months before I felt like I was really making friends or people were willing to offer favours like recip linking.

It makes it tough for the legit and honest newbiw to get anywhere when so many of us have been burned in the past.

More thoughts and feedback?

Cheers
Dzinerbear

I hear you too, mate! I have been burned so often in this business and unfortunately I still get screwed for being too nice and trustworthy.

And I totally agree with so many here, this community is tops and I am always happy when I do business with anyone here.

cheers,
Luke

You know - it's an interesting coversation...

I have rarely been burned by other adult webmasters... HOWEVER...

I have been BADLY burned by allegedly "legitimate" companies (and technical people...) Because - after all - I am only a "pornographer" and I guess... due to the content, I had it coming.

You know - I think there are 2 types in this business.
Those who really do have a sex postive attitude, like what they
do and take pride in their work.

The other type are embarrassed about what they do, are ashamed of their work, are sexually repressed, disregard their customers as "wankers" - and these are the ones who are going to rip you off in the end.

That'll cost ya'll 5 cents. :)

Quote:

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[i]I have been BADLY burned by allegedly "legitimate" companies (and technical people...) Because - after all - I am only a "pornographer" and I guess... due to the content, I had it coming.[/B]

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Ah yes, I forgot about that aspect of things. I had a freelance customer a couple of months back that I spent a lot of time with. It was around the time that I joining MANcheck, so I was talking about getting this really good contract.

He and I talked on and off all day, then he finally asked me point blank, "Well, what does this company do?"

I could have lied, but I figured he was cool.

"Is it legal?" he asked.

A couple of weeks later, he called with some stuff to finish up his site and told me that when the site was done, he had another client for me, but he said, "But you have to promise me that you'll never tell me wife and this person what you really do."

Oh brother.
Dzinerbear

Some great repliesin this thread from everyone :thumbsup:

I have to admit i pretty much agree with all thats been said so far :)

Thank you all for your kind words about the GWW community to we couldnt have made this place as rocking as it is without you guys to so from us to you .. Thank you for makign this place what it is :)
Regards,

Lee

I'm giving this thread a bump because (a) I think there's good stuff here and I'd like to hear more, and (b) I'll be damned if Bec's going to beat me in the longest post contest with her BDSM thread. :crybaby:

So yesterday, I find this other site that's got a bunch of text at the bottom of one of his pages. A few words that he's copied from one of my pages, and then, he pasted the URL of my site along with this text. He's done the same with a whole bunch of like-minded sites, like xstr8guy's. (If you'd like to see if he's ripping you off check this URL: gayfetishpicpost[dot]com[forwardslash]content[forwardslash]program[forwardslash]gay[forwardslash]hdk[forwardslash]rod_stefano[forwardslash]index2.htm
I don't want to actually give him a link that will help him in Google, so just paste the above URL in the address bar and replace those bits in square brackets.)

The only reason he's doing such a thing is to scam traffic from search engines.

So I got to thinking throughout this thread that so many of us have been burned by various people. Don't you think there's something we could do as a group to help and protect one another?

I know that we all talk privately and share information, but wouldn't it be nice to actually have this information compiled somewhere? Wouldn't it be a good idea to have a central collection point where we could log a complaint about a site, a sponsor, or a webmaster? Would it be nice to be able to go to 20 or 30 GWW members and ask them to put the pressure on a guy like this to play fairly? TGP operators seem to do it, why can't we?

Wouldn't it be good to have two levels of GWW members? The general population as it stands now, and then, an inner circle of trusted people, people we've worked with and know are reputable. I know it sounds a bit clickish and I'm not suggesting we don't try to help new people, not at all, it's just this is my business, my livelihood, I need to protect myself as much as possible from scum-suckers like this site owner above.

There are some people on this list that I would help in a second. And I know many feel the same about me, and maybe that's one of the things that's so nice about this place is that it isn't so formal. I don't know, thinking out loud here.

Thoughts?
Dzinerbear

Hey Dzine,

I understand where you are coming from in relation to the whole two levels thing but....

I still see myself as a reasonably new webmaster - and as I see it despite posting on this board and having done business with a few people here nobody has ever actually met me.

Now I'm not suggesting by any means that I'm dodgy or anything of the sort but just how do you propose that people prove that they are genuine when they are a new webmaster - and therein lies the problem with an adult business that is done almost exclusively electronically.

The other way that I see it is something similar to the ebay system (UGGH) I can't believe I just mentioned their name. Anyway maybe once people have done business with someone they could post an evaluation of some sort searchable by ICQ #, AIM handle or similar. Thereby compiling a database of evals or even a short pick from 0-5 stars or something.

My thoughts - Allan

Allan,

I hear exactly what you're saying and I agree with you. But word gets around. I was talking on AIM just yesterday, as a matter of fact, with someone who has been chatting/dealing with you and they said you were a nice/cool guy. So I had already tucked that piece of information away. :)

But you're right, in the earlier stages of webmastering, it would be tough until people got to know you. My experience here on the board was that this naturally happens anyway. I was here a good five or six months posting and asking questions, people were generally friendly and answered my stuff when they could. But after I had been here for a few months and everyone started getting used to me being here (and I didn't appear to be a nutbar) then people started extending other courtesies to me, like putting my banner on their site, giving me TGP partner status, etc.

BTW, update on the above situation I wrote about earlier. I wrote the webmaster and cited my rights under the DCMA 1998 (he had cut and paste text that I wrote) along with some rather heavy-handed threats about the extent to which I'd go to protect it, and I got a reply within the hour. The offending text was removed from his site.

Cheers
Dzinerbear

Quote:

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Originally posted by Dzinerbear
I wrote the webmaster and cited my rights under the DCMA 1998 (he had cut and paste text that I wrote) along with some rather heavy-handed threats about the extent to which I'd go to protect it, and I got a reply within the hour. The offending text was removed from his site.

---

Good to hear!

Cheers,

Allan

Quote:

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(b) I'll be damned if Bec's going to beat me in the longest post contest with her BDSM thread

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LMAO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :goon:

As an affiliate program the fraud is just insane. We have webmasters trying everything possible to screw us out of money. We have lost thousands and thousands of dollars because of this and there is really not anything we can do about it. Just one person screwed us out of 3,000 this year. I think everyone in this industry has been screwed one way or another. I like money just like everyone else but I am not going to screw over anyone to make a buck.

Mark

This is indeed an interesting thread. It is sad to see so many scammers out there and it is hard to find the really honest webmasters sometimes, but I'd argue that having a two tiered system would risk becoming to much of a clique.

I'd also argue that simply because a person has been in the game a long time doesn't make them reputable. I can't even count how many times I have heard some person say 'ive been at this a long time and so i know what i am talking about' when in essence they are merely trying to bully you into buying into their crap.

Problem with any 'black list' is that unless the person being given a black tick can respond, it is inheritantly an unfair system.

It becomes too easy to 'get even' with someone if you are one of the 'in crowd' and as Luke said, there is no way to know really who is and who isn't. One person can say nothing but great things about one while another had a really bad experience, so who judges?

Quote:

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Originally posted by gaystoryman
It becomes too easy to 'get even' with someone if you are one of the 'in crowd' and as Luke said, there is no way to know really who is and who isn't. One person can say nothing but great things about one while another had a really bad experience, so who judges?

---

Excellent point.

My rant was largely out of complete and utter frustration at getting screwed as a result of my success. I worked hard to get here, why shouldn't others work just as hard. Unfortunately the world is full of people always looking for the easy way.

But I learned on the weekend that playing hard ball and sending threatening e-mails works wonders.

I agree on your points about cliques. Very well thought out post.

Cheers
Michael

You know i think this thread is a perfect example of why i value many of the friendships i have built with the GWW community members..

On almost any other community forum a thread of this nature would have turned into a pissing match by now.. this one hasnt, it speaks volumes for each and every one of you.

Thank you all for great people who i value as friends and colleagues :thumbsup:

Regards,

Lee

Awwww, Lee, you made me feel all warm and stuff. Shucks babe, we all love you too... (Or wanna spank you);)

Quote:

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Unfortunately the world is full of people always looking for the easy way.

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That's so true -- just seems that the world is full of a generation now that didn't get taught better behaviors. Stuff I'd of got the stuffing slapped out of me for doing as a kid WHEW!! ... kids now get away with things I'd never of been allowed to do, back talk teachers, drugs, show disrespect for my elders, etc.

I worry about what our world values will be even 10 years from now ... it's a scary mental scenario.

Quote:

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Originally posted by Bec
That's so true -- just seems that the world is full of a generation now that didn't get taught better behaviors.

---

I have to say whilst I understand the point you are trying to make it is a generalisation. It is not just to do with the kids but also the parents and discipline.

I think I turned out OK and I do believe you are referring to my generation Bec.

Cheers,

Allan

Allan,

I think the point Bec was trying to make was that for the most part, todays younger generation (myself included with this generalization) d tend to get away with more shit than we would have had we been born a few years earlier.

Case in point here, my younger sister of 4 years, constantly gets away with stuff that i tried to do and got punished for, the differences even in four years is quite astounding.

Now, take those differences in the generation gap and apply them to the webmaster community as a whole, im sure youll see that for the most part, with EXTREMELY sweeping generalizations most webmasters between the ages of 20 and 30 are nothing more than 'pimp' wannabes who wouldnt know how to do business or what business was if it came right up to them and smacked them in the face.

For that generalized group working as a webmaster is an easy hobby which gets them free beer, food and in some unfortunate instances, sex.

Im sure Bec would also agree with me on the fact that you are one of the individuals who the generalizations we both made in our posts do not apply to :)

Regards,

Lee

Actually, Allan the generation this ideology started with is Generation X, my generation.

Things changed a lot as time has gone by but I can tell you it started with the "ME" generation, when all we could think about is how much stuff can we get and for least amount of effort.

And now those Gen X'ers are parent of a new group who ar elooking for it faster and for free.

Luckily I have parents, who weren’t going to buy into the Gen X mentality and pretty much showed me what life is like if I didn’t work hard and make something for myself.

Unfortunately many in my group didn't get that. And it shows not only online, but offline as well.

My best,
GA

***WARNING 40 PAGE REPLY AHEAD***

Michael I totally understand where your rant starts and how it will continue – and how it is SO justified.

I’m going to climb into my cyber rocking chair and start with my dreaded… “When I first started in this business…” I know so many people hate when I say that but it has a lot to do with my own frustrations and successes in this industry.

When I started in (and the reason I got into) this business was the Internet was about cooperation. You rarely competed with someone you would work together. I was fresh from the cutthroat Machiavellian life of Wall Street. And cooperation was something I tried to so hard to do when I was there. So it appealed to me so very… VERY much.

If you had an idea you could talk to someone about it and most of the time you found someone to back you – monetarily, with hosting or some content images and the like. And if you were opening a site that was competition you would easily get a link from your competitors to give it a try.

One free site easily made $6K in a bad month – and when a fellow webmaster or webmistress was getting married, had a baby, was moving or the like we would all point traffic to them for a week or two knowing it easily meant they made a few grand more - because traffic was more potent than an envelope or a nicely wrapped vase. And since many of us couldn’t be together we did what we could from a distance.

When I decided I needed a change, I got a call from Rick who owned YNOT back then and had a job offered to me without an interview, because people I knew had called him a recommended me. It was the best thing I ever did for myself and the best thing friends could do for me.

When a colleague needed to move out of her house quickly, leaving a bad marriage and with her child, she found a place with nothing in it. The next day she had four delivery trucks and every FedEx and UPS truck in the areas at her door - all filled with furniture, bedding, appliances, food and more.

And if someone got screwed in a deal, you had at least 100 webmasters helping out, trying to make it right for each party.

Now let’s leave the melodramatic love fest and move forward a few years to see the advent of what we have today…

People hear that you can make a million dollars in one year in online adult and they begin to join up in droves. Big companies that were trusted are getting caught double billing members, in an attempt to make up for their gluttony, free sites that made us $6k a month were now barely making $100 a month.

The bottom line changed and you had to work harder for it now.

Those of us who had business plans and directions did what we planned on… Heads went down and we got down to the real work.

The ‘Million dollars a day’ folks started to scramble to make money; following in the footsteps of the double billers and new generation of scammers. And a lot of those honest hard workers we all knew were still spending like they were making it before – their expenses matched the good ole days and the incomes were based in the reality of the times. And, going from ‘having it all’ to ‘very little’ makes some people very desperate. There were more and more people who wanted to do it with little effort. (And in hind site, the effort they put into scamming the masses would have been better used in a long term, honest plan.)

We all did our part to self-monitor the industry… If you were a cheater, you were put on public lists all over the place. If you had a sponsor check that bounced everyone knew because there were sites to report it to. And if you shaved more than the norm, people posted it all over other sites.

The resource sites still went to bat for people… there was a time when I could write to a sponsor and say, “Hey it’s GA and I need your help working out a problem check for a webmaster…” and it would get a response and quickly resolved. Just the other day I sent an email out for someone here on GWW and the response I got was ‘it’s none of our business. Stay out of it.’ I didn’t stop, but I also haven’t heard anything else.

Then comes the GFY generation. A class of webmasters who have no real business in being in this business… their primary goals are to make beer money and get laid. And when they can’t get the most out of some company they bitch and whine about it publicly. Causing more harm than good - because others joining the industry only know what they do from places like GFY - and bitching, cheating and fucking people over becomes the norm.

So those hard working people like the group we have here, put their heads down and work harder to avoid these types of people. And in the mean time begin to form what I like calling families - meeting people on the boards, and getting to see them at shows or talking on the phone. We begin to trust those people. We each bring something different to the table that we can share in order help each other.

I, honesty, think it’s these ‘families’ that are going to succeed. It’s working together, in smaller groups that are going to win out over the loud-mouthed free loaders who want others to do it for them. It’s the families that are going to make the difference by (good or bad) keeping the cheaters out and working with the people who care and are willing to give back.

The web is a very hard place to endow trust to people. It’s no longer something that can be given freely to a name on a board. It’s a commodity of this industry that cannot be thrown around. It is to be earned.

Personally, I’ve become jaded. I want to know someone before I share what I know. I want to know that they are in it for the long run and not looking for me to do it for them. I can’t afford trusting someone off the bat like I did years ago, just to get screwed over, like I have been so many times.

I never wanted anyone to see that hardened side of me, here. I always wanted GWW to be a safe haven for those who took their business seriously – it’s what I ‘grew up with’ online - what I had the moment I started in this business. I wanted to preserve that environment. There has was always been a level of apprehension (maybe not the right word) before I would spill everything I had to share. I think I can safely say, once I knew someone is here and is part of the family - giving out answers or information is done freely and without expectation. And it’s not only me who does it. It’s part of who we are as a community. It’s what makes this group of people so great… and so dear to me. I know if I had to close the site tomorrow, it will be the same group of people I would work with and plan on working with for a long time.

Sorry I spilled all of this in your thread, Michael! LOL But this has been a something that has been bothering me for a very long time. If you hadn’t already guessed LOL

And this was such a good release. And it’s a release that I did not know I needed, until now.

DAMN this is a BOOK!

As always…

My best,
Gary-Alan

Wow.

I am so glad to see your post.

When I started in this online industry, I was trying desperately to get out of the "adult" business. I was an outside player in 976 - doing production and recording for the "big boys". To be honest with you - the big boys in that industry were NOT nice people; I stood between them and the talent, and I didn't like it.

I learned HTML, and started doing real estate and legal sites and the like - and then someone came along and offered me complete artistic control to do an adult site - I ran that site for 7 years (I can't name it, but ya'll probably know it...).

The thing was, my experience with the adult industry in 976 and 900 made me not trust anyone in the industry. I did not network, I did not post, I did not ask for help. I kept my head down, my name off the paperwork and I did not make friends - because my expereince in adult had been so very bad, and to be honest, I wasn't ashamed of my work, but I was very shy about talking to people.

Well - long story short. Bad move. You see, my partner and I sold the site to someone I trusted, a non-adult player who HAD networked in the industry. He knew the few people I knew, and a whole lot of others, was charismatic and charming - and promised me the moon. I went with him partially because he was NOT an "adult" player.

When he took my site - and then refused to pay me - well, guess who had made the friends? Guess who was known? Not me - and the people we knew in common said; "It's none of our business - and besides - Mr. So and So said that you've been saying bad things about us...."

Now my site - the one I built over 7 years of my life - is not being taken care of. It isn't being updated. They have removed the members forum, all email links, and the ability for members to cancel. Their stated opinion is: "All we need to do is advertise, the members are just wankers anyway...." My site has now become worthless - it has lost all the members I worked so hard to get, and they will never come back.

Moral of the story: network. Make friends. Build trusted relationships. Act ethically and morally in all you do. Stick up for those who are being screwed. Do favors with no expectation of reward. Share information. Treat your customers very well - because then, when you recommend someone else's site - you'll BOTH have a new member. There are MORE than enough surfers, there is more than enough money (most people who buy memberships to sites buy more than one membership...) - and quite honestly - one of the reasons we are in this business is because most of us can't stand the way "real-world" business is done.

I am now back on my feet - and the reason? After this all happened, in my despair, I started posting. And the offers came in - free hosting here, free content there, moral support getting me through my first few months of poverty - even offers of personal loans - and massive assistance when I DID land my new client (which ended up making ME look good, and won me a permanant paycheck) - and now I am in a position to help those who helped me.

I learned a very valuable, (though painful and expensive) lesson. :)

ahem.... is this thing on?

oh!

Being a newbie webmaster and new to the entire adult industry - I've felt quite comfy here on GWW.

I've read this post with interest and some really good comments and thoughts have been made. On the flipside... I think I'd be wary (and no disrespect intended) if someone approached me - without getting to know me first - with regard to links and traffic trades etc etc. I would certainly feel awkward and question what was in it for them and is that person trying to dick me.

Of course I have a whole lot to learn and may not be saying anything new, but surely getting a feel for who's legit and "into" their business takes a lot of time. And even then may not always work out.

Just my thoughts *shrug*

With love...
Sean

Wow!

Thanks to everyone for the good reading. Gary, it's great to get some background on the business. I appreciated that. And I'm glad it's not all bad, we do have a good core group of people here.

And what I realized through your "epistle" is that we already have an environment here where the "family" is protected. We already talk to one another behind the scenes, we already help one another, we already watch out for one another. I already knew this on one level, but I reading it helped me absorb it on another.

And Shaun, thanks for your story, too. What you went through was awful, but I'm sure you're a much better person for it and you surely learned heaps. By sharing it with us, we've also learned a thing or two. And people like the guy who ripped you off always seem to get their due in the end. What's most important though is that you didn't become like him. You carried on, you did want you needed to do, and you started over. :groovy:

And the "what goes around" thing is not just a cliche, it really does happen. I experienced it first-hand over the past year. It's not something I can talk about on a board, but we'll go for a beer at some conference some time and I'll tell you all about it.

And Alan, there certainly are differences between generations, I'm not sure if it can all be chalked up to that because there are certainly no lack of assholes my own age. And I remember friends of my parents who had the most horrible kids you'd ever want to meet.

But what Bec is trying to say, I think, is that there is marked disappearance of overall civility in our culture today. How many times have you held doors open for people who have never responded with a thank you? If I did that at K-mart with my family, my father would have cuffed me up the back of the head.

As a video store clerk, I can't tell you how many people stood in front of me talking on cell phones while I checked out their movies, never once inquiring as to how I was or becoming short with me because I interrupted their conversation to ask for their membership number.

Our 24-hour news society has made us less caring because one individual's tragedy can be incapsulated in a 45-second news story, followed directly by one about Madonna's latest hair style. And we're made to feel that we really should care about Britney and Beyonce, or that American Idol is really important. The Internet has made us more willing to rip someone a new asshole publicly because we don't know them, we don't see them, nor can we feel their pain; they're just an nameless asshole on a board.

Thanks for the great discussions. This is been a good thread. I'm feeling better having read through this stuff and as I said earlier, I learned an important lesson this weekend about standing up for my site: if you let people try to screw you unchallenged, they will; if you stand up to them, they'll often back down.

Cheers
Dzinerbear

Quote:

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Originally posted by ozmalegalleries
I have to say whilst I understand the point you are trying to make it is a generalisation. It is not just to do with the kids but also the parents and discipline.

I think I turned out OK and I do believe you are referring to my generation Bec.

Cheers,

Allan

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As the followup posts would support - I do mean it as a generalization and not saying that ALL fit that behavior - and you most certainly don't! You're a shining example of how individuals should conduct themselves!

I'm just saying that the discipline metted out when I grew up isn't what MY generation did with their kids ... perhaps it was a global revolt, I don't know ... but I do know that my generation's kids, and their kids have not been taught the same values. Whether its work values, moral ethics, or what have you ... it's screwed up.

Today a parent has to worry about being called on the carpet, or social workers getting involved if a child screams parental abuse. I've seen a father just totally harrassed by his kids, and unable to just turn em over his knee for a well deserved spanking. They are obnoxious, out of control brats. They've pushed and pushed, know where the lines are and get away with stuff no child has a right to get away with in my opinion.

They disobey, they backtalk, they cuss out their parents in public, they run with peers that are into drugs and theft ... they've been locked up in detention homes, ankle cuffed to ensure curfew compliance .... and as soon as they're back home, they are back on the streets and into trouble. And this isn't just one family I'm describing ... but just about every family I personally know that have kids nowadays.

I'm just saying that when I was raised, that behaviour would not of perpetuated beyond the first occurence. If mom said be in the house at sunset, your ass better be in the house at sunset... or else ... and the "or else" was not hot air ... it meant punishment. period. And god help you if she said "wait til your dad gets home".

Quote:

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Originally posted by Bec
And god help you if she said "wait til your dad gets home".

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Oh my God, and my dad was a cop, so that meant you were going to get the police belt.

I wonder if that's why I love uniforms so much? Freud would have a field day with this.

Cheers
db

when I did AVS back whenever I used to have my AVS sales pitch stolen.

and this one webmaster wannabe stole my whole AVS page only put his thumbs and script but the dumb ass forgot to change the links within the sales pitch.
i was getting signups and rebills from that sucker and never told him untill the page went dead :angel:

i was shocked when i came to the states at how a lot of kids behaved.
my parents never whined i found their porn tapes and magazines or that the cable company played porn unscrambled at 11pm every night. but i knew enough to either hide or be cought and accept the concequences.

this 13 year old girl in HS, grandaugter of a friend of my host-family, wanted to have a baby because she thought it would be fun and babies are cute. she sucked off probably most all guys in the school. at 13 fuckin years old.
when her mom tried to discpline her one time she called her bitch and threatened to call the police on her for child abuse if she got curfew.
when they ask her to put the dishes in the washer, she'd throw them in with food still on them and play dumb like she didn't know

if i pulled one like that on my parents i'll probably won't see the building from the outside for a very very long time.

talking back? my mom would probably slap me on the mouth
hanging out with druggies? I can only go so far from our house, if she has to yell for me too long i get grounded indefinitly.

kids nowadays definitly need some major disciplne applied on them

shaun that's some nice beefy site you have there :)