Anime vs. Cartoon – What Is The Difference?

Date: 2011.02.21 | Category: Content | Response: 0

Over the past three years I have written articles, been a guest on radio shows, and even been part of panels, all discussing the wonders and bewilderment of anime and hentai content. In that time, I thought I had covered most aspects of the niche, the content, the market, the huge underground following, the money making potential etc. Yet I am still being asked on a regular basis questions about the niche and especially about the confusion of what is anime vs. other toon type content. So I decided to re-visit the issue in this article.

One of the newer occurrences that seems to have confused many a webmaster, is the recent surge of content providers now offering images that they have titled as anime. Many of these images are computer generated images (CGI) in 3D like format, which tend to portray almost life like images. While others are cartoon images in various styles, that while they do have their market, are certainly not anime.

Anime and Bishoujo (also known as Hentai) images are very unique in their style and characterization. If you know certain key points about the art work, you will know if what you are looking at or purchasing can truly be termed anime. And believe me, your surfers or members definitely know the difference! Here are some of the key things that you can do to assure yourself of what you are getting:

Eyes: The eyes are one of the most important features of anime style characters; they are the most expressive parts of the face, and are part of what makes each character different and recognizable. Large eyes are of course the one feature that most people associate with anime, but just making the eyes large is not enough. Anime characters’ eyes should always have at least some sort of shading. Anime females in particular tend to have really heavy shading and lots of shiny areas. Male characters have light glares in their eyes, too, though they often are not as large or obvious.

Nose and Mouth: Anime style noses and mouths are pretty straightforward, they consists of three basic simple shapes: a wedge for the nose, a long, thin line for the mouth, and a shorter line to define the lower lip. You will rarely see teeth on an anime character, even when the character is seen with the mouth wide open.

Hair: Hair styles of Anime characters are stylized, unique, and sometimes impossible to have in the real world. Any hair color is possible, be it blond, black, sky blue, light green, orange, pink, all the colors of the rainbow. Hair length is also unusual as most males have shoulder length hair and most females either have really short hair or their hair is at least four feet long.

Now this is obviously a generalization as there will be some variance in images depending on the style of a particular artist. But in general, this is what the anime/hentai surfer will look for. The other key to authentic anime is the style itself, the art is hand drawn and until recently always hand inked or colored as well. Though some artists now draw the sketches by hand and color via the computer, it is still very easy to notice the difference in quality of hand drawn art.
I am not saying that other artworks do not have their market, they certainly do! I just want to make sure, if you are promoting images as Anime that you are truly using anime images, otherwise your sales or sign ups will not be near what they could be.

Now let’s visit toons shall we? Cartoons, toons, sexy toons, erotic art, erotic illustrations, what ever you want to call them, are also very popular with many surfers. Toons are just what they seem to be, illustrated drawing depicting various characters in an exaggerated form. These images are fantastic for use on or for promoting the mired of Toon sites out in the market today. Toons, like Anime can fulfill fantasies that cannot be realized in real life or with real people. If you can think of it, it can be drawn! There is high demand for quality sexy toons because the loyal surfers out there cannot get enough.

There are things to watch out for however even in toon content. Copyrighted characters, this has been a popular debate among those of us that deal and make our living from anime and toons. A copyright is a copyright is a copyright! Whether it be created or shot, the characters belong to the creators. Even if the character has been modified to blur the identity, if it is a recognizable character, ie, Batman, Flintstones, Sailor Moon, DragonBallZ etc. then you can be opening yourself up to prosecution from the copyright holder. Many a webmaster can tell you about hearing from Nintendo, Disney, Marvel and many other companies on this issue. Some providers feel that since such images are a parody of the copyrighted characters, they are protected, and in some cases they might be. But unless you have very deep pockets or a rich uncle to help you win that court battle, I would strongly suggest you steer clear of this type of image.

As with any content you purchase it is important that you do your research and know your provider! Just because some one is selling something, it does not automatically make it legal, nor does it indemnify you, if it is not illegal. Unfortunately, as in all business there are a few bad apples out there that are willing to risk their reputations and their business to make a few quick bucks. If a provider tells you that the anime/toon images they offer come from Japan, and it is ok to use them, because the Japanese artists do not care, run, do not walk from this provider because that is simply a lie. Japanese artists are very aware of the theft of their artwork and many are now utilizing the Bourne Convention (http://www.law.cornell.edu/treaties/berne/overview.html) to actively prosecute offenders throughout the world.

I hope this has helped clear up some of the confusion about anime vs. cartoons, and as always I am more than happy to answer any questions you may have on the subject. You can always find me through my sites.

Article written by Bestat

http://www.exclusivecontent.com

Displaying Special Characters On Your HTML Pag

Date: 2011.02.22 | Category: WebDesign | Response: 0

In order to display certain characters within your HTML pages, you must use a special code. The codes below display the HTML code and the character when displayed on your web page. To use any of the characters displayed within the chart, copy & paste the HTML code to the left of the character you would like to use.

Whilst the above list is by no means complete, it should contain the most useful characters and codes for you to build your sites using the special characters with ease.

Article written by Lee

Masters Of Discipline – Have You Got What It Takes?

Date: 2011.02.22 | Category: General | Response: 0

So you want to throw in your day job and become a full time adult Webmaster? Well yeah, I can hear you saying, “Who wouldn’t want to be surrounded by pictures of beautiful women all day, make up their own hours, and be the master of their own destiny?” It just sounds sooo good when it’s put like that doesn’t it?

Before you tell your boss you quit, you might want to read this article first, as the reality of working in this industry and especially for yourself can be a real wake up call for many.

The main thing you need to succeed in this business is discipline, and lots of it. If there are temptations when you work for someone else to slack off, take a sick day, or simply not bother showing up, then you can double those temptations when you work for yourself.

It’s so easy to roll over in the morning rather than get out of bed, stagger to the PC, and actually work.

It’s so easy to decide to take the day off when the sun is shining and the beach is calling. You simply tell yourself you’ll make up for it tonight, and then find yourself coming home at 3am.

It’s so easy to not actually work, when you work for yourself, that at times it can be unreal.

The reality of doing any of the above is longer nights, less sleep, and almost inevitably smaller paychecks.

Structure Your Day.

The answer to this problem is to really think about your working day and give it some structure, just as you would if you worked for someone else. Work set hours and take frequent breaks. When you work for someone else they make you take breaks for a variety of reasons, but mostly, because as research has proved, you’ll be more productive after one. It’s also important to make sure others know your hours as well, and always remember to add what time zone you are located in on any correspondence. There is nothing worse than being awoken by an associate at 3am because you forgot that little detail!

Set A Routine.

Get into a routine! There are various tasks that must be done each week no mater how boring. By creating a work routine, you can control your time and structure the more boring jobs at the end of the day when for most our creativity levels are less. You can also structure that routine as I do, when I’ve finished those boring tasks at the end of each day, I reward myself with some time doing what I want to do.

Going Solo.

This can be a lonely business and if you don’t like working alone then maybe it’s not the right one for you. You’ll likely spend many hours in your own company and as someone else pointed out to me, while boards and instant messengers are great, they can also eat heavily into your working time if you’re not careful. Personally, I use the boards and chats as a treat when I’ve accomplished a goal, unless I need to talk to someone in order to get that set goal done.

If, like me, your office is in your home, in reality you never really leave work. It’s just always there and there is always something else to be done, and it’s so tempting just to work a few more hours. Having the discipline to stick to your office hours is the trick and where structure comes into play. The saying all work and no play makes Jack/Jill a dull boy/girl is really true here.

The biggest trick of all though, is learning to recognize your limits. Set them and stick to them. Unlike in the normal workplace, you won’t have the big cheese or even the little one watching over your shoulder, making sure you work or making sure that your paycheck and your bills are covered each week. That’s up to you now.

Think Before You Leap.

Another thing you need to consider is can you REALLY afford to give up your day job? Working for someone else means that for the most part you will have a reliable pay check each week or month, when you work for yourself you loose that security. There are other things to consider as well like health insurance, book keeping and how exactly you are going to pay for them. Of course if there is another bread winner in the house this may not be of such a concern, but it’s still something you should consider before you give in your slip. As a general rule of thumb, if you’re considering going it alone, don’t, at least not until you have enough cash saved to cover any outgoings you might have over a six months period.

How well do you know the law? If you think the law doesn’t affect you because your just one person working from home then think again. If you don’t know your Title 18 USC 2257 from your arse then you may be heading for trouble. Standing in front of a judge and saying I didn’t know won’t get you out of a heavy fine or even a prison sentence.

The real questions you need to ask yourself now are you up to the challenge, and do you have the personal discipline to make this work for you?

Article written by Jenne.

http://www.clitical.com.

Billing Solutions For International Surfers

Date: 2011.02.21 | Category: Billing Solutions | Response: 0

We all know the lifeblood of the webmaster is to be able to accept credit cards for site access however, with the global markets emerging more and more, many webmasters still do not realize that they can accept credit cards from international countries at little or no extra cost to themselves or, their business.

Presuming you already have your sites translated into a selection of global formats you need to make sure you can process foreign transactions and, these should be handled differently than regular US based credit card users however. This is what we will approach upon in this article.

The main reason we own our businesses is to turn a profit and, from a profit making point of view is just how the details below will enable you to benefit your long term global business.

The first step you need to take in order to correctly ‘charge’ your international customers is to ensure that you are sending them to the right language, after all, over 70% of internet users can not speak English, let alone read it. This is where having some geo-scripting comes in handy on your join page, the second the surfer hits this page he (or she) will be directed to a localized version of your join page.

Now that you have the surfer on your join page you also need to ensure they have a variety of options available to them to actually finalize the purchase however, you should also ensure that, if they want to view your join page in another language, that they have this as an option too.

Some alternate payment methods for your international customs could include one or more of the following, PayPal, JCB, Mastercard, Discover, Maestro, EuroDebit, Checks and, of course, a dialer.

I would however use the dialer as a last minute option should their chosen method of payment not be accepted.

Even though you may run a ‘recurring’ based site, you might not want to have your foreign surfers recur and risk having their card declined when it comes to authorizing your charge next, for this reason you may like to add the option of a 3 month membership or perhaps a 6 month membership however, make sure you lower the cost of this membership in relation to buying a monthly membership, this might just be the clincher you need to close the international sale.

As with any purchase the after sales support is also needed, especially if you are wanting your international customer to rebill for several months and, trust me, they WILL rebill, often for in excess of 6 months. They pulled their credit or debit card out for a reason and, they will stay if you can give them more reason too.

With any type of sale a follow up is always good, many sponsors and processors send out an email automatically upon sign up, however, how many of these emails are written in the surfers native tongue?

In conclusion, when dealing with international customers you should cater to them NOT make them cater to YOU by doing this you will ensure the longevity of your international business.

Finally, if you have any type of online business you should carefully consider the global market place as it is growing a rapid rate with millions of new international surfers coming online each year this would be a bad business choice on your part if you were not to cater for them.

Article written by Lee.

Building A Surfer Trap – Stage 1

Date: 2011.02.21 | Category: Traffic | Response: 0

The last 2 weeks I have had a LOT of webmasters email and ICQ me regarding traffic and, not getting any sales.

So, I thought it would be a good idea to make a step by step tutorial on building your own surfer trap.

Now these are some of the arguments I have heard why people haven’t already built one over the last few weeks…

* To complicated to follow.
* I want surfers returning to my site.
* Don’t have the time.

The first two however seem to be the ones that I hear over and over again.

First of all, a surfer trap IS NOT complicated, in fact, it is probably one of, if not THE easiest type of site to build.

Secondly, Why get a surfer visiting your site over and over again if they are not paying for trial memberships? All you are doing is wasting your bandwidth.

Thirdly, A surfer trap can be built over a period of time, my very first trap was built within 1 hour my next was built in a day and my next one was built in a week.

So onto the start of building our surfer trap…

The first thing that I want you to do is to look at the Multi-Site FPA’s that ARS in the marketing section and choose ONE of them.

Download it, optimize the keywords on the FPA, make sure you add meta tags, titles descriptions and Alt tags on all images.

Once you have done this, you now need to search through ALL of the single site FPA’s and download and optimize one for each of the ARS sites that you have on your Multi-Site FPA. (Even the gay sites!)

This should take you 2-5 minutes for EACH FPA, any longer than that and you are doing TOO much work!

Once you have all of the single FPA’s downloaded, optimized and uploaded onto your server that is the first stage completed.

Article written by Lee

Using Mainstream Sponsors On Adult Sites

Date: 2011.02.24 | Category: Sponsors | Response: 0

With the adult industry moving more and more into the mainstream web every week that passes as late i thought it would be an idea to show you guys how it is possible to use mainstream sponsor programs on your adult sites to build up a steady commission check even when a surfer going to your adult site doesnt actually buy anything from your adult sponsor.

Mainstream Sponsor Programs – The Choices.

The first thing that you need to do is to choose a mainstream sponsor that offers you a good choice of products / services to market to your surfers mainstream affiliate programs such as Click Bank, Commission Junction and, Amazon.com are all good places to find a selection of mainstream products and services you can offer your surfers in addition to the adult sponsors you currently use.

Mainstream Affiliate Programs – Setting Up.

The first thing that you need to do however in order to offer the mainstream affiliate program products to your surfers is to register a generic, non-adult domain name and, instantly get this domain setup on your current web server.

This will be the domain name you use for all correspondence between the mainstream affiliate networks and yourself in addition, this will also be the ONLY domain that you utilize the mainstream linking codes on.

Using Mainstream Sponsors – Getting Started.

The first thing that you need to do now you have your domain and mainstream affiliate networks sorted out is to build a couple of specific ‘doorway pages’ on your new generic domain name. This could include something like an article or product review or perhaps something as simple as an image of the product and a short description which you can use to lead the surfer into the mainstream affiliate programs site, either way, the idea is to have the root of the domain 100% free of adult content and utilize specific doorway pages which you can link to from your adult sites.

Generating Mainstream Traffic.

Onto the really easy part, your current free sites all have an enter and exit link correct? If so then you are already half way finished, all you now need to do is to ensure that EVERY SINGLE exit link goes to your mainstream doorway page for a specific product or group of products. Make sure that you do not link to the root of your generic domain at any time but only to specific doorways and, that each of these doorways has a link to the root domain.

By linking to your generic site in this way, you are enabling the surfer to choose whether they first of all, want to look at your adult site or, they want to leave the site and go to your mainstream affiliate network sponsor in the process giving you the potential of making a sale at the mainstream affiliate program.

Mainstream Sponsor Programs – An Overview.

By utilizing mainstream affiliate programs in this way you are not only potentially increasing your bottom lines but, you are also utilizing every single click that you get both to and from your site, to often webmasters send their exit links to places like disney.com or google.com and in doing so, they lose out on potential incomes, hopefully when you start marketing your exit links in the manner explained above you will begin to see the benefit of how both adult and, mainstream sponsors can be used in conjunction with each other in order to increase your bottom line profits.

Article written by Lee

Building A Surfer Trap – Stage 5

Date: 2011.02.21 | Category: Traffic | Response: 0

So we hit stage 5 in this surfer trap tutorial.

It was brought to my attention this morning that we never added any ALT tags to our single FPA link so, in a change to the planned tutorial I am going to touch on this stage as, once the search engines get to our surfer traps this is going to be a crucial aspect on how highly we get ranked.

So what’s next?

Ok, now what you have to do is go back to manually editing the FPA’s (All of them!)

What you need to do is this…

Take the Multi-Site FPA first then, on ALL of the links that lead to the single site FPA’s you need to add the ALT tag. Again, in the same way as we did originally however, instead of using this tag on the images we will use this on the actual TEXT of the link so, for example the link which may be:

‘Voyeur Porn’ leading to the FPA you have for the Voyeur niche in the HTML coding will already look like this:

<a href=”mydomain.com”>Voyeur Porn</a>

Will get turned into:

<a href=”mydomain.com” ALT=”More Niche Related Keywords”>Voyeur Porn</a>

The reason we are going back over these links now and not earlier on is because you should hopefully have started to get a small amount of traffic from your counter impressions. These counters are virtually ALWAYS being crawled by the search engines due to the amount of people linking to them so, by optimizing our site at this stage, it makes it less work in getting into the search engines.

One other thing that we can now start to do (as we did a couple of stages back) is to create some more HTML pages with some tables on them, however, these will be HTML pages on their own with no images on them. Again however, you should make them 4 columns across and two rows high.

What you want to add into these tables are NICHE links so for example, taking the TEEN niche we would make eight links like:

Teen Sex
College Girls
Erotic Teens
Teen Porn
Etc
Etc
Etc
Etc…

You should do this for each of the MAIN niches so you would have a table for Teen, Gay, Mature, Asian, Ebony, Fetish and one for General and again, these should link to the NICHE FPA’s that you already have created.

These tables will be used for another console on our surfer trap however, before we implement this console we are going to have some fun with them.

Article written by Lee

JavaScript Know How

Date: 2011.02.22 | Category: Scripts | Response: 0

JavaScript can be one of the most useful additions to any web page. It comes packaged as standard in Microsoft’s Internet Explorer and, Netscape Navigator and allows webmasters to perform field validations, mouse-over’s, pop ups and a whole entourage of other nifty little features on our sites.

In this article we will show you how to:

– Display the browser name and version number
– Change the text in the status bar of the browser
– Use an input box to get text from the user
– Use a message box to display text to the user
– Change the title of the browser window

Before that, however, we need to know how to setup our web page so that it can run the JavaScript. JavaScript code is inserted between opening and closing script tags: <script> and </script>, like this:

<script language=”JavaScript”>

–> JavaScript code goes here <–

</script>

These script tags can be placed anywhere on the page, however, it’s common practice to place them between the <head>and </head> tags. A basic HTML page that contains some JavaScript looks like this:

<html>
<head>
<title> My Test Page </title>
<script language=”JavaScript”>

function testfunc()
{
var x = 1;
}

</script>
</head>
<body>
<h1>Hello</h1>
</body>
</html>

For the examples in this article, you should use the basic document format I have just shown you, inserting the JavaScript code between the <script> and </script>tags. When you load the page in your browser, the JavaScript code will be executed automatically.

Displaying the browsers name and version number.

The “navigator” object in JavaScript contains the details of the user’s browser, including its name and version number. They can be displayed in a browser using the document.write function:

document.write(“Your browser is: ” + navigator.appName);
document.write(“<br>Its version is: ” + navigator.appVersion);

I run Windows 2000 and Internet Explorer version 6, so the output from the code above looks like this in my browser window:

Your browser is: Microsoft Internet Explorer
Its version is: 4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0b; Windows NT 5.0)

Changing the text in the status bar of the browser.

To change the text in the status bar of a browser window, just change the “status” member of the “window” object, which represents the entire browser window:

window.status = “This is some text”;

Using an input box to get text from the user.

Just like in traditional windows applications, you can use an input box to get some text input from the user. The “prompt” function is all you need:

var name = prompt(“What is your name?”);
document.write(“Hello ” + name);

The prompt function accepts just one argument (the title of the input box), and returns the value entered into the text box. In the example above, you get the users name and store it in the “name” variable. You then use the “document.write” function to output their name into the browser window.

Using a message box to display text to the user.

You can display a message box containing an OK button. These are great when you want to let the user know what is happening during their time on a particular page. You can use a message box to display the “name” variable from our previous example:

var name = prompt(“What is your name?”);
alert(“Your name is: ” + name);

The “alert” function takes one argument, which is the text to display inside of the message box.

Changing the title of the browser window.

To change the title of a web browser’s window, simply modify the “document.title” variable, like this:

document.title = “My new title”;

One bad thing about the “document.title” variable is that it can only be manipulated in Microsoft Internet Explorer. Netscape’s implementation of JavaScript doesn’t allow for modification.

In Closing.

As you can see from the examples in this article, JavaScript is a powerful scripting language that can be used to enhance a visitor’s experience with our site. However, you shouldn’t use JavaScript too much because in some cases it can annoy visitors and send them packing before your site even loads!

Article Written By Lee

There’s Face Value And Then There Is Real Value

Date: 2011.02.22 | Category: General | Response: 0

How often do we sign up to affiliate programs based on their standard terms of service for example, Sponsor A will pay you $35 for every signup you send to them and they tell you they convert at roughly 1:200 whilst Sponsor B will pay you $30 per signup and they convert at roughly 1:200 also, which of these scenarios straight off the bat will make you the most money? Think about your answer first then read on.

Negotiate The Figures.

Most, if not all of us would have immediately chosen Sponsor A for the pure fact that they pay you $5 more per signup and they convert at the same rate as Sponsor B however, how many of us would have written or icq’d Sponsor B and asked them to raise their payout? Not many of us I would guess. With that said, what is to stop you from emailing a certain ‘Sponsor B’ if you are able to convert consistently at their published 1:200 and asking for a higher pay rate to continue sending your traffic to them? Nothing at all and, surprisingly enough, I would guess that for most programs, they would actually increase your payout if you have a history with them.

Haggling The Costs.

The example above used a sponsor as the main focus however, how many times have you spent money at a content provider? A hosting company? A traffic broker? Have you actually taken a moment to ask these companies if they would give you a lower rate on the services they are providing you with? Again, I bet not many of us have I know it was only recently when I started asking for long term customer discounts and the likes. In fact, from the first point of contact you have with any company online, be they an adult web host, adult traffic broker, content provider or, in fact, an affiliate program, spend an extra few seconds when you first sign up and see how they can improve their service for YOU. To your surprise they might just cut you a deal that is unmatched anywhere else!

Don’t Undersell Their Products.

With the above said, one thing that you need to be aware of is that if you start making absurd price cuts from these companies you will probably be told to politely take a running jump however, lets say you were going to be charged $50 for something, ask them if you can get the same service at a 10% discounted rate if you use them again, perhaps not even on the first purchase but on the second, the third, etc.

By contacting these companies directly and not just going on ‘face value’ even if you only save yourself one or two dollars per purchase over a year those odds and ends soon add up to a nice saving.

Saving Money – Recap.

In essence many of us take things at face value whether we are talking to friends and peers or whether we are paying for goods and services but, by at least in asking for a discount on our purchase the worst thing that will happen is that you get told ‘no’ however, on the flipside of the proverbial coin, you might just find yourself a better bargain than you had already found in the first place and that’s some food for thought.

Article written by Lee

Over The Rainbow

Date: 2011.02.24 | Category: General | Response: 0

So why is the gay community over the rainbow? As promised today I’ll finish up on the symbols that are prevalent in the gay community. Last week I mention the Pink Triangle and it’s political emergence. And technically, the rainbow flag has a similar political beginning.

I always love answering a question with another question (it is one of those annoying habits I have). So, when I am asked the “what does the rainbow flag stand for?” I look forward to the response when I ask, in turn, “what do YOU think it means?” Here are my top three favorite answers:

1 – “It’s colorful and gay people like colors.”

2 – “It’s a dance party thing”

3 – “Judy Garland sang Over the Rainbow you guys loved her a lot.” (This has to be my all time favorite.)

Well like any political symbol, it is a way to distinguish ourselves. But this time we look not to a place in history but we look at the world in general. No matter where you are, whether it is on 8^th street in NYC or Rue du Champe in Paris, there will be a gay person somewhere. Now, some may argue that not all cultures and societies will have homosexual present. And I say, “BULL”. They are just in the closet somewhere.

So in essence, gay men and women cross every racial and religious culture around the world. We come in all shapes, sizes and colors. So what better symbol to show that with than a rainbow, all colors coming together as one – as one community. No matter how culturally diverse our world is, the gay community is made up from a piece of each.

The rainbow flag and the uses of the rainbow, in the gay community, are diverse. If you see it flying outside on a restaurant wall, and it means it is a gay or gay friendly establishment. See a set of rainbow rings around a friend’s neck, it’s gay fashion accessories. And see a political march with rainbows on posters and flags, it’s a gay assembly.

Last week I insinuated that the pink triangle was not a symbol to over use in design. Well, in my opinion, the opposite is true with the rainbow and the rainbow flag. I am NOT saying run out and re do all your sites with rainbow backgrounds. No! But, I am saying that the nature of this political symbol is somewhat more flexible. We ourselves took the rainbow and made jewelry, publications, tee shirts and such. And just as the pink triangle, the rainbow will say that it’s ok to be here, you have friends inside or you have nothing to worry about here – be yourself, this place is for you.

So what have we learned? What some people think as silly symbols that gay people use, actually have an origin – and, a potent origin at that. I still ask, for your own good, that you use them wisely and not over do it. The more you throw symbols around willy-nilly, the more people will think you do not know what you are doing. And the more that the surfers thinks that, the less likely you are to make the sale and get your business to grow.

Article written by Gary-Alan