An Interview With Mike Strouse of Mayor's Money
Mike Strouse AKA Mayor is the owner of Mayor's Money. He also founded Porncity.net, the internet's first free adult host and was a frontrunner in the race to bring true HD quality videos to porn sites. Mike was kind enough to take some time out of his busy day of looking at hot chicks and beating his employees to answer our questions.
Webmaster Vault (WV): You started porncity free hosting way back in the day. Can you tell us briefly when you started that and how it came about?
Mayor: Essentially I saw everyone was being kicked off of Geocites back in 1996 so I went hunting for a program to allow form upload which was only supported in Netscape and ended up finding a Perl post card script I could hack. I went about writing the first “porn host file manager” for my free host. People had to upload one file at a time. The whole concept blew up so fast I spent the better part of 2 years barely sleeping, dealing with ISP’s trying to find homes for servers. It eventually peaked out in the top 10 most visited sites in the world.
WV: Is the free host still in existence?
Mayor: Nope, it became impossible to sustain a model like a free host when internet advertising took such a giant hit and bandwidth still cost 800 a megabit because we had very long shitty contracts. But stiffycash had pretty much taken all my time by then.
WV: If I remember correctly you started an affiliate program for liveteen and that evolved into stiffycash then along came mayor’s money. Was liveteen your first stab at an affiliate program?
Mayor: Actually the timeline goes like this:
Liveteen was the flagship site in Mayor’s Money in 1997 (partner program)
Then Cashmachine.porncity.net a short lived click program took liveteen and Mayors Money over.
Then Stiffycash was our per join program and it incorporated our other sites like snatches.com, lezbos.com etc . . .
WV: Did you buy the sites that are in your program or are they all built from scratch?
Mayor: 100% built from scratch.
WV- What part of the world are you located in?
Mayor: Fort Lauderdale, FL.
WV: How many employees do you have?
Mayor: As of today about 15 but it goes up and down depending on my mood ;)
WV: What drew you to the adult business and inspired you to get into the biz?
Mayor: I built a website for a local sexshop in addition to mainstream companies. Once I saw the power of on banner ad on a site listed with Persian Kitty I dropped all my non-porn clients and went to work on porn :)
WV: Was porncity your first venture into the adult industry?
Mayor: Nope, snatches.com, asses.com, lezbos.com, porntv.com were all prior to porncity.
WV: What is the best thing about running an affiliate program?
Mayor: Cool affiliates that honestly are a pleasure to work with. The technology we get to play with, the work environment and the money.
WV: What is the most frustrating thing about running an affiliate program?
Mayor: Whiny affiliates. They are fickle, quick to complain, don’t tell people when you’re converting well because they don’t want to “saturate” your sites. The second something goes wrong, they are all over your shit on GFY.
WV: Where do you see your program heading?
Mayor: I’ve always been known for pioneering so I am going to keep doing that. We took GEO IP ads to a level that most had never seen, we viral market, we use AI technology to bring the experience to the surfers. I am going to continue this trend and continually re-shape the way people think about marketing.
WV: Any cool new projects coming down the pipe?
Mayor: Yep :) but we’ll be making some waves with them later. For now I gotta keep hush hush ;))
WV: If you could change one thing about the adult internet biz what would it be?
Mayor: Tough question. I guess there is a lot that should change. Stopping abusive spammers, CC fraud, 1% Visa and MC rules, board whores. But in all honesty, I do what I can in my business to make things they way I like them and I don’t worry about other people’s shit. I make sure the company I run and businesses I deal with operate in a fashion that is ethical and good over all. I avoid the rest.
WV: I’ve heard you are planning something called the “phucket junket” any hints about what this will be?
Mayor: It’s the Phuket Gathering www.phuketgathering.com and I STRONGLY recommend anyone who wants to be face to face with industry leaders and company owners attend this show. It’s not a show for 200 retarded sales guys to go get trashed. It’s probably one of the best places to meet the real decision makers at companies face to face in an extremely relaxed, yet very exotic and beautiful environment.
WV: Your BBS board was one of the first real webmaster hangouts. How does it feel to see so many people following your lead and using your idea?
Mayor: I’m used to being ripped off. For years, everything I do gets copied and often improved. I think next time I’ll wait and copy someone else ;))
WV: Where/how did you meet Brooke Skye?
Mayor: We met her at a shoot with photo Greg and he recommended her for our first solo site.
WV: Is Brooke’s site your biggest site?
Mayor: Brookeskye.com, Katyoung.com and Crazyclubchix.com all fight for top sales and traffic.
WV: Can you tell us about some of your adventures?
Mayor: Jeeze, there are so many, but the most crazy adventure was my wedding.
WV: How did you meet your wife there?
Mayor: Lets just say we met ;)
WV: Is she enjoying having her own site?
Mayor: Very much so, she has complete creative control of the shoots and scenes.
WV: There was some issues between you and the people that run Melissa Midwest’s sites a little while back regarding something that happened between Melissa and Brooke on the Bubba The Love Sponge show. Has that been resolved or is it still an ongoing issue?
Mayor: Ongoing and cannot be discussed at this time.
WV: Any regrets about being in the adult biz?
Mayor: I regret never being dirty spammer before there was filters and before it was illegal, making 100’s of millions and retiring ;) J/K I honestly have no regrets at all and there is just as much opportunity today as there was 10 years ago.
WV: One final question. You and the entire mayor’s money crew are on a plane and you crash in the Andes Mountains, who do you eat first?
Mayor: Ramos, cause that fucker never shuts up and you gotta have some beer with dinner so we’d eat Tylo next since he’s usually got more beer in him than blood ;)))
Mayor: Essentially I saw everyone was being kicked off of Geocites back in 1996 so I went hunting for a program to allow form upload which was only supported in Netscape and ended up finding a Perl post card script I could hack. I went about writing the first “porn host file manager” for my free host. People had to upload one file at a time. The whole concept blew up so fast I spent the better part of 2 years barely sleeping, dealing with ISP’s trying to find homes for servers. It eventually peaked out in the top 10 most visited sites in the world.
WV: Is the free host still in existence?
Mayor: Nope, it became impossible to sustain a model like a free host when internet advertising took such a giant hit and bandwidth still cost 800 a megabit because we had very long shitty contracts. But stiffycash had pretty much taken all my time by then.
WV: If I remember correctly you started an affiliate program for liveteen and that evolved into stiffycash then along came mayor’s money. Was liveteen your first stab at an affiliate program?
Mayor: Actually the timeline goes like this:
Liveteen was the flagship site in Mayor’s Money in 1997 (partner program)
Then Cashmachine.porncity.net a short lived click program took liveteen and Mayors Money over.
Then Stiffycash was our per join program and it incorporated our other sites like snatches.com, lezbos.com etc . . .
WV: Did you buy the sites that are in your program or are they all built from scratch?
Mayor: 100% built from scratch.
WV- What part of the world are you located in?
Mayor: Fort Lauderdale, FL.
WV: How many employees do you have?
Mayor: As of today about 15 but it goes up and down depending on my mood ;)
WV: What drew you to the adult business and inspired you to get into the biz?
Mayor: I built a website for a local sexshop in addition to mainstream companies. Once I saw the power of on banner ad on a site listed with Persian Kitty I dropped all my non-porn clients and went to work on porn :)
WV: Was porncity your first venture into the adult industry?
Mayor: Nope, snatches.com, asses.com, lezbos.com, porntv.com were all prior to porncity.
WV: What is the best thing about running an affiliate program?
Mayor: Cool affiliates that honestly are a pleasure to work with. The technology we get to play with, the work environment and the money.
WV: What is the most frustrating thing about running an affiliate program?
Mayor: Whiny affiliates. They are fickle, quick to complain, don’t tell people when you’re converting well because they don’t want to “saturate” your sites. The second something goes wrong, they are all over your shit on GFY.
WV: Where do you see your program heading?
Mayor: I’ve always been known for pioneering so I am going to keep doing that. We took GEO IP ads to a level that most had never seen, we viral market, we use AI technology to bring the experience to the surfers. I am going to continue this trend and continually re-shape the way people think about marketing.
WV: Any cool new projects coming down the pipe?
Mayor: Yep :) but we’ll be making some waves with them later. For now I gotta keep hush hush ;))
WV: If you could change one thing about the adult internet biz what would it be?
Mayor: Tough question. I guess there is a lot that should change. Stopping abusive spammers, CC fraud, 1% Visa and MC rules, board whores. But in all honesty, I do what I can in my business to make things they way I like them and I don’t worry about other people’s shit. I make sure the company I run and businesses I deal with operate in a fashion that is ethical and good over all. I avoid the rest.
WV: I’ve heard you are planning something called the “phucket junket” any hints about what this will be?
Mayor: It’s the Phuket Gathering www.phuketgathering.com and I STRONGLY recommend anyone who wants to be face to face with industry leaders and company owners attend this show. It’s not a show for 200 retarded sales guys to go get trashed. It’s probably one of the best places to meet the real decision makers at companies face to face in an extremely relaxed, yet very exotic and beautiful environment.
WV: Your BBS board was one of the first real webmaster hangouts. How does it feel to see so many people following your lead and using your idea?
Mayor: I’m used to being ripped off. For years, everything I do gets copied and often improved. I think next time I’ll wait and copy someone else ;))
WV: Where/how did you meet Brooke Skye?
Mayor: We met her at a shoot with photo Greg and he recommended her for our first solo site.
WV: Is Brooke’s site your biggest site?
Mayor: Brookeskye.com, Katyoung.com and Crazyclubchix.com all fight for top sales and traffic.
WV: Can you tell us about some of your adventures?
Mayor: Jeeze, there are so many, but the most crazy adventure was my wedding.
WV: How did you meet your wife there?
Mayor: Lets just say we met ;)
WV: Is she enjoying having her own site?
Mayor: Very much so, she has complete creative control of the shoots and scenes.
WV: There was some issues between you and the people that run Melissa Midwest’s sites a little while back regarding something that happened between Melissa and Brooke on the Bubba The Love Sponge show. Has that been resolved or is it still an ongoing issue?
Mayor: Ongoing and cannot be discussed at this time.
WV: Any regrets about being in the adult biz?
Mayor: I regret never being dirty spammer before there was filters and before it was illegal, making 100’s of millions and retiring ;) J/K I honestly have no regrets at all and there is just as much opportunity today as there was 10 years ago.
WV: One final question. You and the entire mayor’s money crew are on a plane and you crash in the Andes Mountains, who do you eat first?
Mayor: Ramos, cause that fucker never shuts up and you gotta have some beer with dinner so we’d eat Tylo next since he’s usually got more beer in him than blood ;)))
Mayor has been paying people on time like clockwork for years. To promote their hi-def solo girl sites and other great sites check out www.mayorsmoney.com
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October 5th, 2010 at 5:13pm EST Rating:  |
