Annoying Questions I'd Like Answered...

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Fri Jun 21, 2013 11:02 am

Okay, so my sister has been looking at various ideas in regards to making money as a side thing to her Uni studies (and to also supplement my income - as a full time worker I'm still on the social). We both occasionally get commission money from drawing porn, so she has suggested the idea of drawing porn as a paysite thing.

She actually did reasearch, and found domain registration, virtual server hire and SSL support comes to about $30 a month*, meaning ten subscriptions at $5/month actually gets a (very small) profit. Now I'm still dubious, largely because I'm unambitious and pessimistic, but also because we're two people of whom basically nobody knows, with "not awful, but not professional" art skills, and it's just drawn, not photo stuff, if you can't find this stuff for free, there's something wrong with you**.

Thing is, part of my job will involve a state-paid course in Info Tech, which includes stuff for "being a webmaster". If it does give enough training, I might look into it, slap a bunch of initial costs down and see if we can generate a profit over next year.

How correct am I in my assumptions that this will not work? Are there some hidden costs I have neglected to see? I'm kind of looking for concrete reasons to state "And here is why it won't work so we shouldn't go ahead" beyond the bit where it's weird for siblings to do a joint-porn thing, so any such reasons would be great.

*Obviously we'd need to tjeck how much CCBill or whatever would charge as the fee for "using them as the payment method".

**Admittedly people will pay upwards of ten bucks for a commission, and I have the capacity to make dating sim games and stuff, complete with publisher software that makes the installer and everything and has a licence to "sell it if you want, whatever", which is a bit more interesting.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Fri Jun 21, 2013 11:27 am

I'm actually curious as to how you get commissions, ie, what you're doing to attract them. I've been "formally accepting commissions" as it says in my signature, with the actual info up in a couple places, and had no interested parties.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Fri Jun 21, 2013 11:49 am

You do it in a place where that's specifically what people are looking for, and it really helps if it's some kind of fetish thing on the grounds that it's harder to find art for any given specific thing, so people into that thing will be willing to pay more for it.

In my case, I was already releasing free stuff fairly regularly/for some time - I'd been uploading art there since 2007, and of my 240 pictures on that site, 25 are commissions. Some other number are specific requests from before I charged money - I only really started charging because my tablet died and I thought they'd be willing to help fund my new one (which they did indeed do).

So there's a decent chance you'll need to hang around a fetish-based community you can stand (which can be hard), regularly put pictures up there and sort-of become known as an artist there, take free requests, get a bit of a fanbase, then start charging.

DSMatticus · Post by **DSMatticus** » Fri Jun 21, 2013 12:11 pm

I don't know if paysite is the way you would want to go unless you already have a lot of exposure and quality art.

If I were able to create and peddle smut, I'd probably try to make money through commissions and donations and then do whatever I could to maximize my exposure, which means a totally free website, trying to add minicomics/animations/flash games/games that are not flash/whatever, posting my stuff everywhere, topical abuse of rule 34, and so on.

Edit: not to say this is a good idea. I'm pretty sure there's not a lot of money to be had here unless you get spectacularly lucky, but it shouldn't be too expensive to try (and if it turns out to be expensive, I don't think the investment is justifiable) and if you enjoy drawing smut in your free time then there's not a whole lot to lose, beyond the time setting it up and maintaining it. Not to mention "we're sisters and we draw smut together" is an attention grabber.

name_here · Post by **name_here** » Fri Jun 21, 2013 12:37 pm

I think the drawn stuff is usually commission based, though there's this giant paysite borg called Hentai United nowadays.

Prak: While I am not a person who commissions art, I glanced at your DeviantArt profile and it failed to impress. Put up some more full-colored final products.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Fri Jun 21, 2013 12:45 pm

DSMatticus wrote:Not to mention "we're sisters and we draw smut together" is an attention grabber.

Well we don't draw it together - neither of us has ever seen smut drawn by the other, actually.

DSMatticus · Post by **DSMatticus** » Fri Jun 21, 2013 1:05 pm

Koumei wrote:
DSMatticus wrote:Not to mention "we're sisters and we draw smut together" is an attention grabber.
Well we don't draw it together - neither of us has ever seen smut drawn by the other, actually.

Noted, but I meant 'together' more in the sense of collaborative enterprise. It's awkward enough as a business proposition, I couldn't imagine it as a hobby.

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Fri Jun 21, 2013 1:24 pm

I know people who get excited at the prospect of siblings doing anything remotely related to sex/porn, either having it or making it, respectively. They need to get out more, or actually have a brother/sister so they can realize that sibling incest is really not good. Genetically and reproductively speaking, it's worse than copulating with ones parents.

erik · Post by **erik** » Fri Jun 21, 2013 10:50 pm

Shrapnel wrote:Genetically and reproductively speaking, it's worse than copulating with ones parents.

By... what metrics?

There's 50% genetic material shared either way. Reproductively speaking the parents are older and are more likely to have age-related risk factors for disorders passed on reproductively.

I just don't understand the quoted bit. Seems a weird place to stake the pole in the ground factually.

angelfromanotherpin · Fri Jun 21, 2013 11:07 pm

erik wrote:There's 50% genetic material shared either way.

No there is not. You can share 100% of a siblling's chromosomes, or 0%. (Actually getting zero percent is extremely unlikely for a variety of reasons.) You are statistically likely to share ~50% with a sibling, but the actual variation possible is huge.

erik · Post by **erik** » Sat Jun 22, 2013 5:21 am

angelfromanotherpin wrote:
erik wrote:There's 50% genetic material shared either way.
No there is not. You can share 100% of a siblling's chromosomes, or 0%. (Actually getting zero percent is extremely unlikely for a variety of reasons.) You are statistically likely to share ~50% with a sibling, but the actual variation possible is huge.

Fine, on average there's 50% shared either way. As likely as it is that you will be closer to your sibling, you may just as well be further apart. Getting 0% would be like flipping a coin 20,000 times and getting heads every damn time. I think we can rule that out from being likely to happen before the sun sputters out.

As for the sharing of 100% of a sibling's genes, that happens if you are identical twins... but reproduction is usually out in such cases so I ignored that case.

For concerns about deleterious recessive genes a parent has, the parent is already a known quantity of having said gene, the sibling at least has the chance to not to.
[edit: ugh, I am loathe to qualify, but I've already been nitpicked once. This is only in reference to if you know your parent-mate in question has a recessive gene of concern.]

My point holds that there is no reason to assume that genetically or reproductively a parent is a superior mate to a sibling. Now, I'm not saying sibling sex is a positive thing, just that Shrapnel's statement makes no damn sense to me. This being the annoying question thread, I'm wondering what the hell he's talkin 'bout.

Corsair114 · Post by **Corsair114** » Sat Jun 22, 2013 6:57 am

I was curious as to what this thread was about.

Now I know.

Apparently it's brother/sister incest.

I wish I didn't know.

Anyone have a line on cheap brain bleach?

erik · Post by **erik** » Sat Jun 22, 2013 1:02 pm

Meh, it'd be better if this was framed in plants or with dog breeding or something to keep from being squicky.

I'm not expecting a clear answer from Shrapnel since it was probably off-the-cuff gibberish and not something with scientific basis. I may have to live not knowing.

I'll just use this

You can have some too if you want.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Sat Jun 22, 2013 1:47 pm

Thanks, as much as I'd rather the conversation had not gone on that tangent, I was indeed looking for discouragement from starting the site up (and the trouble that goes with that even just to run a simple forum - isn't that right, mods?) and that was supplied.

Given my accommodation conditions, my income (while very low) is okay, so I figured I'm fine in the meantime (the meantime being "until this volunteer work turns into paid work, and they're actually getting onto that), and I can actually just go "Oh hey, here, have fifty dollars."

fectin · Post by **fectin** » Sat Jun 22, 2013 1:58 pm

You might be better off running it similar to a webcomic: give your product away, because people won't subscribe anyway, then make money hawking t-shirts and dead trees and such.

Also, $30/month is a bit steep. Go with dreamhost (or similar) to start with; you can always transition to a VPS later. (Also, having a webspace is very nice. Personal wikis are great generally, and are the best thing ever for RPGs)

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Sat Jun 22, 2013 3:59 pm

erik wrote:I'm not expecting a clear answer from Shrapnel since it was probably off-the-cuff gibberish and not something with scientific basis. I may have to live not knowing.

If I'm making sense, then I'm obviously doing something wrong.

Maj · Post by **Maj** » Sat Jun 22, 2013 5:11 pm

See, I think you guys should totally sell your artwork, just not on your own website. Use multiple free platforms in order to build up a good following of people.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Sat Jun 22, 2013 11:02 pm

fectin wrote:You might be better off running it similar to a webcomic: give your product away, because people won't subscribe anyway, then make money hawking t-shirts and dead trees and such.

Also, $30/month is a bit steep. Go with dreamhost (or similar) to start with; you can always transition to a VPS later. (Also, having a webspace is very nice. Personal wikis are great generally, and are the best thing ever for RPGs)

I've seen people who use Deviant Art and Tumblr for their comics. Hell you can also use Facebook to build a following, though in the case of porn, you'd need a teaser graphic or such.

But I'm all for more smut comics like Oglaf. If I knew what stopped her from updating more frequently, I'd try to arrange it so that obstacle was no longer in the way.

erik · Post by **erik** » Sun Jun 23, 2013 1:07 pm

Prak_Anima wrote: But I'm all for more smut comics like Oglaf. If I knew what stopped her from updating more frequently, I'd try to arrange it so that obstacle was no longer in the way.

Indeed. One thing I love about Oglaf is that the comics aren't just smut, if it is funny it gets written. Tis a good practice to have funny come first.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Sun Jun 23, 2013 10:24 pm

Hell, they tried to go straight into porn, but they're just too funny-

Oglaf SFW Portal wrote:This comic started out as an attempt to make pornography.
It degenerated into sex comedy pretty much immediately.

But yeah, honestly I'd still like it if it had no smut (though possibly a tiny bit less), but she created a world I'd love to game in, with or without sex in the game.

...damnit, someone should do it as a setting for Dungeon World.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Tue Jun 25, 2013 10:44 am

Okay, I lost my mobile phone. At work. Which is a school. So that phone is gone.

It's pretty old and had dead pixels and all anyway (and was prepaid, not on a contract), so this is as good a time to upgrade as any. What kind of smartphone that is not an Apple would people recommend? I was thinking maybe an Android of some variety?

Sigil · Post by **Sigil** » Tue Jun 25, 2013 1:24 pm

I've really liked the Samsung Galaxy line of phones, currently have the S3, friend has the S4. They're great.

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Tue Jun 25, 2013 2:59 pm

Yeah, the S4 rocks.
Several colleagues have it and i am this close of switching from my Note to the S4 . .
Do you have a Smart-TV oder other Entertainment Hardware from a company that also makes Smartphones?
If you have a Sony Playstation and a Sony Smart-TV for example, i'd go for a Sony Smartphone that meets your requirements. They usually have some nifty tricks with their own Hardware.
Same for Samsung Smart-TV. Go for a Samsung Phone then.

sabs · Post by **sabs** » Tue Jun 25, 2013 3:26 pm

Stahls? I've been thinking of getting a Note II when they come out. Why are you thinking of switching from the note to the s4? What don't you like about the note?

I currently have an S3 which I love.. but I'm really tempted by the note's bigger size.

Meikle641 · Post by **Meikle641** » Tue Jun 25, 2013 3:31 pm

I enjoy my Nexus 4 a fair bit.