Dear members and fans of Staxus,
This is going to be a longer post, but I hope most of you will read it. Ever since we have launched Staxus.com and offered unlimited daily downloads, we have noticed a big increase in our scenes being shared on free tube sites, public file sharing sites and other pirate business models. We will continue to offer downloads to Staxus but I wanted to post a letter discussing piracy, how it affects the industry and why it is bad, not just for us but for all other studios out there.
Some of you might not be aware how exactly piracy affects us and the industry in general. Piracy is not a victim-less crime, the financial repercussion is very real and it costs real human jobs.
When we do a scene for you, we have to pay the models, it’s their job. That scene is then edited by a video editor, we have photos taken by professional photographers, then we send it to the content management team that publishes the scene on Staxus. There is also a copyrighter that writes the description text and there are a lot of people working to create marketing materials for affiliates to promote it.
What is an affiliate? Affiliates are basically online sales-men. They have small blogs or review sites and for each scene we do, we send them photos of the scene, a small trailer and some information. They do the hard work writing unique text for the scene and promoting it on the blog. They earn a share if one of their readers comes to Staxus and joins the site. Ever since tube sites started to kick off, most affiliates can now hardly make any sales. They have bills to pay just like you and me, they have to pay their rent, they have to pay for hosting and they work a lot to get just 1 small sale.
More and more affiliates are forced to quit what they are doing. This means many of your favorite blogs that you read on a daily basis are in real danger of closing in the very next minute, as they no longer have money to sustain them!
Since about 4 years ago, free tube sites really took off. People started to take scenes & videos from premium membership sites and post them to these illegal tube or file sharing sites. This has grown so massively that now you can find full DVDs and thousand of scenes for free on these pirate sites. For many people out there, Staxus or or any other studio is no longer a premium porn producer, they are just a channel on a free tube site. Tube sites are not producing anything, they just steal our content and they hide behind their users to do it.
People don’t understand that to produce and sell that scene models, directors, photographers, editors, copywriters, data entry guys, designers, programmers and affiliates worked together. But tube sites don’t do that, they just take the video for free and uploads in on their site. That’s right, 10 to 20 people have worked on producing something and then someone comes and steals it away, making money off your hard work.
Piracy is costing human jobs. More and more studios are going bankrupt, the models are getting paid less and less and it is becoming very hard to produce quality. How can you compete with something that is free?
Tube sites have lowered quality across the industry. In just a few years, they managed to almost destroy premium quality. What people fail to understand is the more videos get uploaded to illegal tube & file sharing sites, the more studios and companies go out of business. This means that if it continues this way, in a few years you will not be able to enjoy Staxus videos or any other premium studio out there.
It is very hard to take legal action against these illegal sites. Like any other pirate, they are hiding behind companies and off-shores around the world. They post on their site an address in London only to find out a bit later that the company is actually registered in Panama. Then you go there and you get redirected to Luxembourg. They are very shady and fighting back has become extremely difficult.
What can you do about it? It’s easy! You can start by educating your friends and family. Most people don’t understand that tube sites are stealing content. They don’t want to pay a few dollars a month when they get it free. The price for Staxus for a month equals 4-5 beers in Western countries. If you skip going to the cinema twice a month, you can buy a full Staxus membership and get access to 15-17 videos that month. Staxus and other studios monthly membership cost as low as 4 packs of cigarettes.
Why would you encourage the pirate industry and in the process destroying historic studios and producers when a membership is so cheap and it offers you premium content, HD quality, better speeds, security against hackers, virus-free files and you get a steady flow of content that you like?
So educate your friends, explain that piracy is risking thousands of human jobs. Actors, directors, assistants, designers, programmers, distributors, affiliates. They all risk loosing their jobs and you risk not being able to watch the premium content you loved for so many years.
You can also report to us any video scene or Staxus DVD that you see on these illegal sites. We can then take them off. We cannot do this alone as we are 1 studio and there are probably 10.000.000 illegal tube sites and file sharing sites out there. Some of our members have been kind enough to report these to us. They understand the fragility of the business and how any small help is appreciated in fighting this.
So guys, the next time you see a friend enjoying porn on tube sites, let him know that porn costs a lot of money to produce and that there are a lot of people working to produce it. The next time you download a scene from Staxus or any other studio, don’t upload it on tubes or file sharing sites, it is destroying the business and it a few years there will be no more quality around.
Thank you for your attention and I hope you will enjoy Staxus for a very long time!
Should you have more doubts about piracy or have a suggestion in regards to this subject, please leave a comment or continue the discussion on the Staxus Forum.
Kind regards,
Andy
