Damn Brad...If you want people to read it, do it Duck style...
just cut and paste the whole fucking thing.....
The Ultimate Brad Shaw Interview
by Duke Floored
I email Lensman before I begin the giant task of transcribing my 40-minute talk with Brad:
The nastiest thing he said about you was:
* That you had a nervous breakdown last night when you banned him and posted on his board (I explained that "Lens" on JBM was not you but he did not believe me)
* He says you are mad at him for employing Cheshire, who used to work for you.
...............
Lensman replies:
There are over 60 other adult webmaster boards out there. GFY doesn't spam on other boards and doesn't allow other boards to spam themselves on GFY. That has been GFY's #1 rule since day one. Other boards respect that. If someone repeatedly ignores that rule, their posting privileges on GFY will be disabled.
There are only five basic rules on GFY.
http://www.FuckYouLensman.com/gfy_faqs.html
Basic Rules of GFY
1. No spamming other boards! We don't spam other boards about GFY. We need the same courtesy!
The rest of his ramblings you mention below are nonsense.
..............
I emailed Cheshire for comment and she did not respond. But her picture looks hot.
I just died in your arms tonight. It must've been something you said. That's a much maligned song.
..............
Brad: "The timing of your interview turned out to be good."
Duke: "What was the inspiration for starting up www.justblowme.com?"
Brad: "I've supported so many other chat boards over the years and made so many other people money, that it just seemed like a natural progression to open up my own board. I've been asked 50 times to do it. Finally, someone came to me with an idea that I wanted to do. There's money in chatboards, traffic you can put into your programs. With all the hours I was spending a day on GFY and Oprano and other boards, it just made sense."
Duke: "Do you think anyone is really making any money with chatboards aside from GFY?"
Brad: "GFY is obviously the 10,000 pound gorilla. Yet a few other people make money."
Duke: "How is Justblowme any different from the other chat boards?"
Brad: "I'm there. We have a private strictly-business password-protected forum. The main board isn't that much different from GFY except we're trying to moderate it more and make it a better read than GFY. We didn't start this up to compete with GFY.
"I want to make money. I want to control the webmaster traffic. I want to have a forum to promote my programs. We have a rewards program for posting."
Duke: "What's the nature of your relationship with Lensman?"
Brad: "He and I don't know each other that well. We've never done that much business. He never appreciated that I posted on GFY. Then I stopped posting on GFY. He would go out of his way to get me to come back there. I don't have anything against the guy. We were supposed to have dinner next week when I was in Lake Tahoe, but he seems overly sensitive. I don't know why he took things so hard. His history shows that he's overly sensitive."
Duke: "What's your critique of GFY?"
Brad: "It has the most webmaster eyeballs. It's a busy place. Unfortunately, the past weeks it seems to have gotten out of control. That he had this huge cash-cow that was going downhill, he decided to take a more hands-on approach.
"I think the job he's done as a moderator speaks for itself. I'm not a good moderator. He hasn't done a good job. I think he's done us more good than harm because of all the free publicity. Banning me from his board... I don't need GFY and GFY doesn't need me. I think him closing any threads by anyone questioning what he did last night shows paranoia on his part.
"I've never been about being number one. I'd be happy to be the number two chatboard."
Duke: "What else are you launching?"
Brad: "We just launched a new version of SICCash.com, our webmaster program. We have better stats.
"I haven't pushed our webmaster program much. It's done its own thing the past few years. My staff takes care of it and I make private deals. With the changes going on in webmaster programs [lower payouts], we'll pick up more traffic because we're maintaining the higher payouts."
Duke: "How have the VISA/MC programs affected your business?"
Brad: "We're less aggressive with our cross-sells, which has cost us money. To stay under 1% chargebacks on a monthly basis is tough. It takes resources, thinking, planning."
Duke: "David van der Pool?"
Brad: "He's a brilliant businessman. I don't think he's going to pay me ($100k Brad claims he's owed). He won't come to the boards like KB."
Duke: "Has speaking out on the chatboards made you or lost you money?"
Brad: "It has made my business from the start. I dropped off the chatboards when I got engaged and married. My focus wasn't into business. Since I've come back to the boards, I've made a lot of deals and made a lot of money. Just being around more, on ICQ more, being more vocal, has helped me do more business. Just opening my own chat board for a week has open up doors. People want to do business. People want to be seen on Justblowme. For every one who hates me, there are five people who love me.
"This new chat board is a challenge. Other than that, this business is boring."
Duke: "You enjoy the controversy?"
Brad: "It is boring to sit in front of a computer all day. Controversy spices things up, and 98% of the time I am able to take the controversy and turn it into business. I'm not here for the attention. I'm in this business to make money. I didn't seek to have controversy with Lensman. He brought that on himself.
"We still have a shooting studio in Vancouver. We're shooting reality video for a lot of the big players. We shoot 30-50 hardcore scenes a month."
Duke: "What happened to your feud with KB?"
Brad: "I haven't seen KB (Kevin Blatt) around. You can only beat a dead horse for so long."
Duke: "Why were you buying a mailing list in the first place?"
Brad, pauses. "Is that a rhetorical question?"
Duke: "No."
Brad: "I was buying a mailing list to mail."
Duke: "But isn't that spamming?"
Brad: "It was supposed to be an opt-in mailing list [bought from David Schlesinger at Vivid, the sale brokered by KB, for a crappy mailing list]. The first time we mailed it, we found out it wasn't an opt-in mailing list."
Duke: "What sort of mail programs do you have? How aggressive are you?"
Brad: "We do little mail. The only mail we do is off the bottom of our boxes on our paysites that collect email addresses. With all the new legislation and mail blocking. It doesn't matter how legitimate the mailing address is, it is still a pain in the ass to get it through to Hotmail, AOL..."
Duke: "Do you stay in touch with JoeE [Joseph Elkind]?"
Brad: "We send emails back and forth a couple of times a week. He says he will announce some exciting news on Justblowme.com tomorrow."
Duke: "Doesn't he owe you money?"
Brad: "We had a misunderstanding and we worked it out. He paid me everything."
Duke: "Did John Bennett (J
and JoeE work things out?"
Brad: "I try not to get involved with that because I have business relations with both of them."
Duke: "What do you love and what do you hate about working in this business?"
Brad: "I love the money. I've made some good friends. I hate the anonymity of the business. It is too easy for non-businessmen to come into the business. The level for entry is too low." Duke: "Are you around porn models?"
Brad: "Never. I haven't attended a porn shoot in 18 months. I'm a businessman. I try to distance myself... I don't have the patience to deal with talent."
Duke: "Are you monogamous?"
Brad: "Absolutely." Five second pause. Brad: "That was an interesting question. I wasn't expecting that."
I have the feeling throughout the interview that Brad is prepared for whatever I will ask him, and if he is not prepared, he's going to keep his tongue on a tight leash. So I threw this in to see what would happen.
Brad: "I don't do drugs. I don't live the crazy lifestyle. My wife and I. We stay. We watch reality TV. We go to the lake. We travel. I live low-key. I'm public on the chat boards but at home I'm low-key. I'm in this business to make money to support my family.
"If you were to talk walk into my office in Dallas, you'd have a hard time telling what we do. I like to run a professional business."
Duke: "If you're running a professional business, isn't it dangerous to become romantically involved with the people who work for you?"
Brad: "It's probably not a smart thing but how else are you going to meet people? It just so happens that I met someone who came to work for me. I fell in love and I got married and I couldn't be happier. I'm not going to make any excuses for that. I don't think it is a good idea to make a habit of it. I plan on sticking with this one for a long time."
Duke: "There seem to be some people who sleep their way in and out of jobs."
Brad: "I don't care to comment on that."
Brad says VISA/MC are of more concern to webmasters than prosecutions for obscenity. "If VISA/MC decided to make the chargeback limit .75%, I don't think I could get under that. And I run a clean operation.
"When I started going after David van der Pool, I got a lot of emails telling me to watch my ass. If someone owes me money, I am not going to shut my mouth."
Duke: "Even if a person is alleged to have organized crime connections?"
Brad: "I could care less. It takes two seconds to find where I live and where I am every day.
"People joke about me going to conventions with bodyguards. I don't need bodyguards. I walk around by myself."
Duke: "Did you see traffic to Crescent back in the day?"
Brad: "I didn't send one hit to Crescent. I was so high on my own horse, I wouldn't send traffic to Crescent. In hindsight, I probably should have. I was brokering a lot of traffic then and I sent it to my own sites. I could've made a lot more money sending it to Crescent. My morals were so high back then but I didn't do it."
Duke: "What's happened to your morals?"
Brad: "The business has changed. Would I send traffic to a scam now? Probably not."
Duke: Did you send traffic to John Atherton's Paris Hilton thing?"
Brad: "I can't say we didn't because I don't control the traffic directly. Would I? I'd be lying if I said I wouldn't because I know he'd pay me."
Duke: "Have you done business with Greg Lasrado, Scott Phillips, and the other webmasters out of Brisbane?"
Brad: "Yes. Several years ago, some of the Australians felt like they didn't need to license content. I was able to work that out with them. Now all the big Australians own all my content properly licensed. I went at it on Netpond with Scott Phillips and we worked out our differences. These days, those guys aren't around much. They've made so much money...