A Power Paradox: The Male

Consumer of Online Pornography

Jennifer A. Johnson, PhD

Virginia Commonwealth University
Leeds, England 2009
 The Male Consumer
Both
• a man subject to patriarchy and the
demands of hegemonic masculinity
AND
• a consumer subject to the consumer
demands of modern imperial capitalism.
capitalism
Collude to constrict his choices
 Political Economy of Pornography
• Socialist Feminist Approach
• Questions center on how pornographic sex
is sold?
– How does the industry extract a profit?
– How does the industry relate to its customers?
– How does the industry market its product?
• In other words, how does the industry cull
24.9 billion dollars from the pockets of
primarily male consumers?
 The Alliance
• Patriarchy & Capitalism are co-dependent
systems of exploitation (Hartmann)
– Capitalism provides the material means for
establishing male solidarity = control over
women’s economic/domestic labor.
• All men can dominate some women = solidarity
among all men
– Aligns all men’s interests with the interests of
capitalism.
• BUT, material means for domination are no
longer guaranteed under modern imperial
capitalism.
 Culture Lag
• However, patriarchy is still wedded to
hegemonic masculinity (Kimmel/Connell):
• Defines what it is to be a ‘real’ man
– Centered on:
» Power, Control and Dominance
» Othering
» Needs constant affirmation because it is unstable
form of identity
• Such public acts are increasingly harder to
find in post-modern society (Nock)
– BUT sanctions for failure to validate HM are
increasingly punitive (Pascoe).
 A Paradox of Power
• Quiet sense of desperation among men as
they search for increasingly scarce
avenues to prove their masculinity (Sobel).
• Male power in modern imperial capitalism
is collectively positioned, whereas
individual men are experiencing unstable
micro-level power (Brod).
– Institutional male power co-exists with a
personal sense of powerlessness among
men.
 Thesis Statement
• Commercial Pornography resolves the paradox and
preserves the alliance by offering men a reliable
source of masculine validation in return for a steady
source of profit.
• The diminishment of HM proving grounds
circumscribes men’s choice making him more
vulnerable to economic exploitation by capitalism.
• In other words, hegemonic masculinity [patriarchy]
makes him vulnerable to the marketing strategies of
the commerical pornography industry [capitalism].
 Research Objective
• Map the structure of the online commercial
pornography industry to illustrate how the
network functions to:
– economically exploit men’s need for
masculine display.
– limit and circumscribe consumer [male] choice
to maximize profit.
 Methodology
• Social Network Analysis
– Quantitative methodology
– Both visual and metric output
– Terms:
• Nodes
• Links
– Descriptive methodology
 Methodology
• Coded ‘News & Reviews’ press releases
published on AVN and X-Biz for all of 2007
• Links include:
– Website launch/development
– Production/Distribution agreements
– Technology use/development
– Financial connections, i.e. affiliate cash sites
– Marketing
– Subsidiaries
• 1077 lines of code
 Results
• Largest Connected Component
– 508 Nodes
– 712 Edges
• Sparse Network
– Density = .0027
• Mostly Porn Industries
– 70% of nodes are pornography business
• Dependent upon mainstream technology
 Node Types & Frequencies
Node Types # %
Conglomerate 6 .01
Producer 91 .18
Distributor 115 .23
Affiliate Program 38 .07
Financial 15 .03
Marketing 49 .10
Website 93 .18
Technology 74 .15
Personals 22 .04
Digital Porn Organizational Network

Spider-like:
Hub Network
with long arms
 Structural Analysis
• Online pornography network is structured like a
spider web, casting a wide net to capture
economic expenditure
• Structural Goals:
– Maximize economic exploitation of the clicker
– Create/market addiction
– Catch the ‘curious clicker’ and transform him into the
‘member clicker’
• Key node in the online porn network is the
Affiliate Program
 Dominant Players/Hubs

Red = Porn
Blue = Mainstream
Gray Box = Hubs
Principle Components
 Playboy Ego Network
Conglomerate
More
embedded in
mainstream

Green = Affiliate Program

Red = Porn Website
Yellow = Distributor
Pink = Technology
Blue = Mainstream
Gray = Conglomerate
 Hustler Ego Network
Conglomerate
More
embedded in
online porn

Green = Affiliate Program

Red = Porn Website
Yellow = Distributor
Pink = Technology
Blue = Mainstream
Gray = Conglomerate
 Affiliate Programs

Red = Porn
Blue = Mainstream
Green = Affiliate/Porn
Gray = Hubs
 Video Secrets Ego Network
Affiliate Program

50%
websites

Green = Affiliate Program

Red = Porn Website
Gray = Conglomerate
Yellow = Distributor
Orange = Marketing
 Braincash Ego Network
Affiliate Program

44%
websites

Green = Affiliate Program

Red = Porn Website
Yellow = Distributor
Purple = Producer
Gray = Conglomerate
 PremiumCash Ego Network
Affiliate Program
71%
websites

Green = Affiliate Program

Red = Porn Website
Purple = Producer
 Sugar VOD Ego Network
Distributor
6%
websites

Green = Affiliate Program

Red = Porn Website
Yellow = Distributor
Purple = Producer
Gray = Conglomerate
Pink - Technology
 Yappo.com Ego Network
Distributor
13%
Websites

Green = Affiliate Program

Red = Porn Website
Yellow = Distributor
Purple = Producer
Gray = Conglomerate
 Vivid Ego network
Producer
.06%
websites

Green = Affiliate Program

Red = Porn Website
Yellow = Distributor
Pink = Technology
Blue = Mainstream
 Shane’s World Studios Ego Network
Producer
0%
websites

Green = Affiliate Program

Yellow = Distributor
Purple = Producer
Blue = Mainstream
 Affiliate Programs
• Simply put, affiliate programs, also called
associate programs, are arrangements
in which an online merchant Web site
pays affiliate Web sites a commission to
send them traffic.
 How Affiliate Programs work
• There are three basic types of affiliate
program payment arrangements:
– Pay-per-sale (also called cost-per-sale)
• Affiliate is paid a % of the cost of the item sold
– Pay-per-click (cost-per-click)
• Affiliate is paid a set $ for each click
– .02-.05 per ‘unique’
– Pay-per-lead (cost-per-lead)
• Affiliate is paid $ or % for each person who fills out
a form which = a new lead
– Trial Membership
 Porn Affiliate Program Tools
• Niche Sites
– Specialized gonzo content
• Designed to attract in the ‘curious clicker’
• New/Exclusive Content
– Content is updated frequently with clips/pics that are
exclusive to the affiliates
• Designed to keep the clicker coming back
• Free Content
– Limited clips and pics available at no charge
• Designed to draw the ‘curious clicker’ deeper into the site
 Porn Affiliate Program Tools
• Cascading Billing
– If one biller declines ‘clicker’, information is
automatically sent to another biller.
• Designed to maximize chances of payment and
minimize ‘leavers’
• Blind Clicks
– Clicks that lead to somewhere other than what
the clicker expected
• Designed to ensnare the clicker in a web of links
 Porn Affiliate Program Tools
• Exit Consoles
– Pop-ups that appear when leaving a site
• Designed to remove choice from the clicker
– I.E. Click OK to leave and then the site remains open

• Push Technology
– Content is pushed to the clicker without
request
• Designed to remove choice
Goal is to convert the curious clicker into
the member clicker
Examples of Porn Affiliate
Programs
 Political Economy of Online Porn
• Affiliate Programs
– Develop websites to cast a wide net
• Distributors
– Deliver content to affiliate sites
– Mediate between affiliate sites and producers
• Producers
– Economic center of the network
– Mediate between pornography and
mainstream
 To Catch a Curious Clicker
• The goal of the online pornography
business network is to ‘convert’
– Transform a ‘curious clicker’ into a member
clicker
– Limit Consumer [Male] Choice
• Pivotal role of ‘affiliate’ programs in
marketing addiction and casting a wide net
– Create algae blooms using HM as bait
 •Marketed as addictive
•Designed to remove choice
•Expand points of entry into the network

me
me
me
me
me
me
me
Back Up Slides
4.5
4.28
4
3.62 Every second - $3,075.64 is being
3.5
spent on pornography
3 2.84

2.5 2.5
2.19 2005 (Billions)
2 2006 (Billions)

1.5 1.34

1 1 0.95

0.5

0
Video Internet TV/Phone Magazines
 The AdultBroker Ego Network
Affiliate Program
An Affiliate
Program
Network

Green = Affiliate Program

Red = Porn Website
Yellow = Distributor
Pink = Technology
Blue = Mainstream
 Mainstream Connections

30% of
businesses are
mainstream
industries
 Mainstream Connections

Production,
distribution and
marketing of
porn relies
heavily on
mainstream
technology
 Product Distributions

Red = Porn
Blue = Mainstream
Green = Affiliate
Yellow = Producer
 Project Goal
• The goal of this project is to expand the
lens of pornographic exploitation to
include the male consumer.
– Not about ranking exploitation
• Map the business network of the online
pornography industry
– Not about the construction of sexuality
– Not a content analysis
• New angle in pornography research
 Thesis & Methodology
• Commercial Pornography plays a pivotal role in
maintaining the symbiotic relationship between
traditional patriarchy & modern industrial capitalism.
capitalism
• In order to maintain respective hegemonies,
patriarchy and capitalism collude to construct the
male consumer as a point of exploitation.

• Social Network Analysis

– Map the operational environment of the online
pornography industry to illustrate this collusion.