how do porn companies make money when their product is free?
In: Economics
You’re first of all making the assumption the product is free
A large volume of the “free” porn out there falls into a few buckets:
1) Promotional Material: Usually it is a shortened clip or a limited display of images (free samples). The idea is that if the viewer wants to see more, they’ll pay for the content. This has been around for a very long time – back in the day, there were lots of specialized ‘TGP’ sites where producers would host previews in the hopes of attracting customers
2) Ad Supported: Most common on “legitimate” tube sites – ads play and they get a cut. Or they get rewarded for “clicks” on ad links.
3) Pirated: Most of the “free” porn out there is just stolen content
With #3 they aren’t making any money and this has been an issue for decades. This hurts niche porn producers the most, since they have a smaller audience to begin with and that audience is more likely to buy porn overall than ‘vanilla porn’ consumers (think fetish content). While the internet expanded the consumer market, it also vastly expanded the piracy market due to the ease by which it can be done and distributed
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