Episode 49: Dominic Ford on Building JustFor.Fans, Fighting Censorship, and Creating a Home for Kink
August 22, 2025 • 36 mins
In this raw and deeply revealing episode, HungerFF sits down with Dominic Ford (@DominicFord), founder of JustFor.Fans (@JustForFansSite), for an unfiltered conversation about what it really takes to build a sex worker-led platform that centers kink, community, and creator autonomy.
We talk about:
The early days of JFF and how it rose from porn studio roots
Why corporate-run platforms like OnlyFans fail fetish creators
How JFF protects extreme content from censorship & payment bans
The ethics of consent, transparency, and performer safety
Why queer creators deserve tech built by us, for us
And how Dominic prepares for the growing threat of political attacks on adult content
Dominic doesn’t hold back. He talks openly about the emotional toll, the philosophy behind his work, and what scares him most as the industry faces increased scrutiny from the far right.
Whether you’re a fan, a creator, or someone building your own path in adult tech—this is a must-hear episode on authenticity, ownership, and kink liberation.
🎥 Full video episodes available early on
🎧 Audio available on all major platforms:
🍏 Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/408WLLX
📻 Amazon & Audible: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/57bbf689-250a-4c96-8559-0a79805f18b6
🕗 New episodes drop Fridays at 8PM
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to Brolapse, the fistingpodcast that goes deep explore
my life, views and raw, unfiltered conversations with
the creators that are redefiningkink connection in the fisting
community. Hey, you guys, welcome back for
another episode of Brolapse. This is episode 49 and I'm
really excited about today's guest.
We have Dominic Ford, the owner of Just for Fans on Brolapse
today. So welcome, Dominic, Thank you
(00:22):
for coming on. Very excited to have you.
Thank you so much for having me,guys.
Yeah. No problems.
As I said, you're you've been inthe industry for.
A long time. Seven, I think 17 years, 18,
That's crazy. Maybe 18 years this next month I
think. If you've been in the industry
18 years, you we we started at the same time.
Yeah. That's crazy.
(00:44):
And here we are now like almost 20 years later.
So what I wanted to talk about today specifically was I wanted
to bring you on because just forfans as the biggest fan
platform, fan content platform on the Internet alongside the
other. But what I like about just for
fans is that it's such a positive space for fetish and
content fetish content creators.It's a safe space.
(01:06):
And so I really kind of wanted to talk a little bit about that
and just in general about like how just for fans came to be.
So I guess I'll start at the beginning.
You started just for fans around2018 two thousand and seventeen
2000 and. 18 Yeah. So we we launched the site on
Valentine's Day of of of 2018, so February 14th, 2018.
OK, awesome. So after that was after years of
(01:28):
running your own studio and performing in adult films.
So what inspired you to shift from being in front of the
camera to behind the camera to building a tech platform
specifically for sex workers? Yeah, so I, so I started
dominicford.com, which was a, a porn studio.
We filmed everything in 3D. It was pretty cool.
I, we, I started out in 2008 andthen so we've been, we were
(01:49):
around for quite a while before just fans.
So I mean studio kind of studio in general, studios were sort of
flatlining and user generated content and like amateur content
was the trend and, and it was before fan sites, it was the
trend. It was the trend on, you know,
xhamster and, and the, and the, the various tube sites.
Like it was very clear to me that that user generated content
(02:10):
was gaining traction and often times more interesting.
I remember we filmed some, so I'm in Fire Island right now.
We filmed something years ago onFire Island and it was beautiful
with, with the trees and, and the dunes and everything was
gorgeous. And I remember sending the
footage to my friends saying, take a look at this.
The pictures are so amazing. And they're like, yeah, but have
(02:30):
you seen this clip on like Pornhub or wherever it was?
And it was some guy in college jerking off in his poorly
made-up room with one IKEA torchin the corner.
He could barely see anything butBut there was this authenticity
about it and something taboo. I'm watching something that I
wouldn't see because it's private and they preferred
(02:52):
watching that to my gloriously produced thing.
Dude, do you have no idea how many times on this show I've
said that I've made an amazing piece of content that's
perfectly lit, perfectly framed,and it doesn't do as good as the
the videos of me in my bathroom fucking doing whatever?
It's crazy to me they don't. Right, so that happened.
This is long before Only Fans and the fan sites, but it was
(03:13):
just clear to me that there's anauthenticity that studios are
never going to have that this kind of content had.
And then when Only Fans came outand it was, it was clear that
they were geared toward the straight side.
And they also, they were not from the industry.
And I didn't really know what the industry didn't understand
the industry. Then when I came out, I was
like, OK, here, here's a, a goodidea for any number of reasons,
(03:35):
especially the financial benefits to the models that
studios don't provide and the agency that this kind of idea
provides. But I, I want to build one for
the, the gay side of the industry with an understanding
of that side of the industry andan understanding of the industry
in general and the ecosystem around it, which wasn't in our
competitor, for example. So I would go to these
conferences right there. There's adult conferences for
(03:57):
those who don't know every year.And always the topics of
conversation were piracy and tube sites and taking over the
world and what are we going to do?
Then later years, the conversation turned to a fear of
only fans because producers and managers and affiliates and
photographers, they're in our ecosystem, but they didn't have
(04:17):
a place in that platform to makemoney.
And so so the industry was afraid of that platform because
there weren't any inroads for most of the industry.
So when I built Just for Fans, Ivery specifically wanted to make
sure that there was a business model that included affiliates
and included managers and included all these things so
that everybody who was used to making money in the studio model
(04:39):
could make money on the fan model.
That's really amazing that you thought of.
I'd never even considered that when I when I was thinking about
this subject that that's something that had to have been
worked into it. That's really incredible.
So you coded the platform yourself?
Yeah, Correct. Yeah, I'm a software engineer by
trade. OK, that's amazing.
So and you remain deeply involved in its day-to-day
operation. So how has being the developer
(05:00):
and the sex worker shaped the way you built just for fans?
And does it impact how the site evolves over time?
Sure. I mean, so myself and all of our
staff is 100% staffed by sex workers.
And so we're all using the platform, you know, and so the,
the flaws that people see in theplatform, we also see and, and
the things that work, we also enjoy and, and we, and we're
(05:23):
building tools that we want to use to make our lives easier
and, and to make more money off the content that we produce.
So. And you're, you're always
introducing new features. They started seeing the
advertisements from other content creators showing up in
my feed and all that. Yeah.
Is that a? Yeah, that's new.
That's new as I don't remember when I launched it, but probably
new in the last six months anyway.
(05:45):
Yeah, Yeah. And it's doing gangbusters and
that's doing gangbusters. I was always afraid to launch
features that models had to pay for because it was really not on
my ethos to ever have models payfor anything.
But models kept saying, can you promote me?
Can how do I get promoted? And finally, I was like, okay,
well there are tons of ways thatthe site promotes you for free,
but but for those who are looking for extra, here's a way
(06:07):
to do it. And these ads are converting in
crazy high numbers, so I'm superexcited about it.
Amazing I am. That's really awesome.
I don't if you knew this but I started using my Just for Fans
page again. I'm thrilled.
I'm absolutely thrilled. So I'm actually updating it
again. So I'm gonna probably start
utilizing the advertise featurestoo, so.
Yeah. And that way I don't feel bad
about model spending money because they're making it,
(06:28):
they're making it back five foldor tenfold, you know, So it's
like it's like a little upfront,but investment, but it's coming
back to the models it almost immediately.
Nice, that's awesome. So just for Fans is run by
people like you said, who are sex workers or sex worker
adjacent. Why does that matter to you so
much? Is it just because of the
understanding that they have of the industry?
Or what do you think gets lost when adult platforms are run by
(06:49):
outsiders or corporate interests?
Yeah. So this is a core tenant of the
just for Fans ethos, if you will, like our, our, our
community building efforts is that everybody, everybody that I
hire is from the industry. Everybody.
I think everybody that works forus is now on camera or we're,
we're on camera. We hire them.
I think maybe there's one personwho manages pages and isn't on
(07:09):
camera, but but our entire customer service team and I
think there's ten of them now, they all come with, they all
come from people who had pages on our site.
And then when we look to hire, we put out a note to our model
base, say here's the position that we're looking to hire and
we hire from within that base. It is a core tenant.
It is incredibly important to mefor a number of reasons #1
(07:33):
they're models who use the site.And so again, if you, if you're
having a problem, odds are they've had the same problem or
they know how to fix it, or theyjust know a better way to to do
it that maybe you haven't figured out yet.
So there's that. And then there's always this,
you know, we're very stick, we're a very stigmatized group,
right? And you don't know when you're
writing into somebody for help if they're going to secretly
(07:54):
judge you or not take your side or assume that you're an idiot
because you're a model. And I think having models on the
other side that are treating youwith respect and treating you
with dignity and treating you from being within the fold makes
a overwhelming difference in howyou can communicate and
understand us as a company. Yeah.
And I will say that I always deal with Jeremy and he is
(08:17):
fantastic. I text message Jeremy at all
hours of the night sometimes. And I'm just like my friend from
Paris is having a difficult timewith this and he doesn't know
who to contact. And so your customer service
team is really amazing. Jeremy's incredible that they're
all amazing. And, and, and part of part of
the sort of built in thing wherethey're also models is that
they're, they're already passionate about the site and
(08:38):
they're passionate about the industry and they're passionate
about other models succeeding, You know, and, and I think that
if you had a random call center in, you know, whatever country
that call center is in, they don't give a shit about you.
You know, you're, you're, you'rean entity that makes them money
and that's how they treat you. And that's not how our team
(08:58):
treats models. That's very true.
And I've had a couple of, you know, a couple of issues and
I've had to deal with customer service with you guys and it's
been nothing. It's been always a a breeze.
It's been always a breeze. All right, let's so let's switch
gears a little bit and talk about the edition King
conclusion part of just for fans, which separates it from
only fans. So for those of you guys that
don't know, only fans is based in the United Kingdom.
I'm correct if I'm in memory serves correctly, and they have
(09:20):
some of the strictest obscenity laws on the planet, basically.
So there's a lot of things that are not allowed on only fans
that just for fans says, I guess, you know, obviously being
based here is allowed to includethat only fans can't.
So only fans has hard lines against fetish content,
especially fisting, but just forfans embraces it.
So what was the and I'll never forget.
(09:41):
We're not anti lapse. We are pro lapse.
I will literally never forget that.
It was so fucking funny. And So what were the biggest
challenges in creating a platform that allows the kinds
of content that most others won't touch?
So, so you're right in that geography makes a difference.
We are in the United States and and our competitors are not.
I would hasten to say that that's the only reason why there
(10:01):
are certain rules in other sites.
So like, yes, things are more strict in Great Britain, but I
think there are also internal rules that are going on in our
competitor sites that are made-up by them and not
necessarily by people above them.
But you know, you can ask, you can ask them to clarify that we
don't impose any rules internally other than what is
(10:22):
forced upon us. And the rules that we are forced
to implement come from the government and then and, and,
but more often or not than not, they come from the credit card
processing companies who are more strict than the government
typically is. So that's it.
And we work very, very closely with our banking partners
because there are rules that that are somewhat, sometimes
(10:44):
they're somewhat broad. And so to be like, OK, well,
here, here's the rule, but like,here's the specific instance
that a model wants to do. Does this really fit in there?
Or is it a Gray area or is it not a Gray area?
And we work very, very closely with our banking partners.
And every time something comes up, instead of us just denying
content outright like other people, other sites do, we'll go
to our banking partners and be like, here, here's what it is.
(11:06):
Where does this fall in the line?
And so we are constantly advocating for our models and
trying to to to more more narrowly slice our understanding
of what the rules. Are that's amazing.
I know the hoops I had to jump through when I started my
website for what I was able to create was all dictated by the
credit card companies. And so I had a couple of I had a
(11:27):
incidents where I was going to work with another management
company and my content was so extreme that they were were
concerned that their their chem sex website would be under fire
if they put my fisting content in the same umbrella category.
And I was like, so you're going to protect them and not give me
a chance? What the hell, man?
So have you. So I guess this sort of this
(11:48):
sort of piggybacks on the same thing.
Have you faced any payment processor issues or legal
friction from hosting content? Like, or have you, how have you
navigated those? Primarily through just
negotiating with the Yeah. So, so we haven't, but the
reason that we haven't is because we are so proactive
about about this. We don't leave anything to
chance. So we're constantly working with
the baking partners on everything that we do.
(12:10):
And so we haven't faced backlashbecause we're very, very close,
in close contact with them constantly.
So, so no, which is which has been great.
Great. Awesome.
So kink, this is kind of, this is interesting.
Kink content often walks a line between edge and ethics.
So a lot of times you'll see like some pretty like rough
stuff happening on the gang bangs and stuff like that.
(12:30):
Like what systems or principles does, does or France have to
ensure that content? Excuse me?
The consent, transparency and performer safety stay front and
center. It's it's a good question.
So we have our consent center, which is where a model uploads a
video and then has to get the consent form sign by every model
who's in it. We greatly encourage and I think
(12:51):
most kink studios do this. We greatly encourage producers
who are models who are creating the content to create some kind
of a pre roll, a pre reel where the models discuss what's going
on and what they're going to do.Just so that if there's ever a
question that arises, there is some video evidence that it was
known and consented to. Because if there is a a problem
(13:12):
that arises, we obviously have to take the side of of the
person who's questioning it unless there's documentation in
in some format. So I.
Just discovered about that the other day.
Say it again. I just didn't interrupt you, but
I just discovered that the otherday like that.
That's a thing. That's the industry like
standard in the industry now that they record the consent in
video format. I, I haven't, I haven't done
studio porn in so long and I have always just kind of done my
(13:34):
own paperwork or whatever. So I didn't know that that was a
thing until just Brian Bonds told me about that.
Just a couple weeks. Ago, yeah, especially with, with
sort of more fetish or extreme content studios like it's it's,
it's more and more important to have these kind of things
documented just in case something, some issues arise
afterward. Yeah, that's great.
It was. I thought it was really clever
and I'm probably going to start doing it.
(13:55):
Yeah, I mean even those for likethe people who who wear masks.
And so yes, you can you can weara mask in your video, but record
a pre roll where you're not in your mask so that we are a
hundred 100% sure that it is you, because what we don't want
is some kind of stolen content with somebody wearing a similar
mask to what you typically wear.You know, we so like what you
(14:16):
record for the public is is one thing, but then we need backup
stuff if problems arise. Right, that makes a ton of
sense. I always tell people that it's
for like consent forms and all that stuff.
It's for both of our protection.It's like, you know, it's for
it's for both of us. It's not just for me, for you to
Yeah, for fans was a response tothe one-size-fits-all model of
(14:37):
mainstream platforms. Is that fair to say?
Like and then So what features have you built specifically to
empower fetish creators, especially those doing high risk
content like fisting or a role play or anything like that?
Is there any features that have been implemented to
specifically, I guess not protect but for those types of
creators? Well, I'll, I'll tell you sort
of what we, what, what we do forthe fetish with the fetish
(14:59):
community features. I don't know if there's specific
features on the site, but external to the site, some of
the things that we do, for example, we've created a, a
chart of fetishes and what we allow versus what our
competitors allow. And, and we sponsor a ton of
events that are focused to the fetish community.
(15:20):
And at all of those events, we have this printed out in huge
form and then as takeaways so that the fetish community knows
exactly what the differences are, what we, what you can do on
our side or you can do on other people's sides.
And we have all of this on, on our side as well of what, what
content we are allowing don't allow.
But we really market this in the, for the fetish events that
(15:43):
we do know the Folsom St. and Dark Lands and you know, you
name it, King down South, we do so many of our events are very
finished focused. So when it comes to tools, I
think of not just like, like techie tools on the website, but
but what other tools are we providing that market, that
audience? And, and, and these are the kind
of things that that we're constantly showing face, we're
showing up, we're being present at these events and we're
(16:05):
showing you what you can and cannot do.
And half of our, you know, I told you, we talked about our
customer service team being 100%models.
At least half of them are fetishmodels, if not more.
In fact, maybe all of them, likeI'm all of them, but but at
least half that I can think of right now, they're all in the
fetish world. So like they're very, they're
very focused on this. Well, kink and fetish stuff is
(16:28):
getting more and more popular. There's this wave of, I mean,
especially with fisting, it feels there was a period of time
where it was the end of the roadsexual activity that you did at
the end of your porn career. And now it's just like people
are coming out of the gate at 18with all this.
I'm like what the? Fuck yeah.
Where do you go from there? From being the first Fister on
Just for Fans to the amount of fisters that are on just for
fans now. It's really it's crazy.
(16:49):
It's it's it's really. Yeah, the.
Community we have a just yeah and thank you I mean I mean you
are you are part of the reason that that we have that community
and we have a huge huge fisting community.
So thank you for for being the the trailblazer of that, but.
Do what I can say thanks for thanks for giving me a space
because you know, in the beginning, like I wasn't
monetizing my content. I was just giving it away for
free on X tube and then actuallyMacias von Fisenberg told me
(17:11):
he's like make money with your content.
Him and Howard from Fab Scout were both were like get on just
for fans. It's just started in there and
so I was on there and and the very, very beginning.
So time flies. So you've built a reputation as
a major anti piracy advocate on the adult, excuse me, in the
adult industry, what technologies or systems is just
for fans used to protect creators, especially those
(17:32):
making vulnerable or niche content?
So for those who don't know, well I started my porn company
in 2008, dominic4.com in 2000. I want to say 11 I started
another company called porn Guardian and what porn guardian
was and was a not just a DMCA service, which means, oh,
there's lots to explain here. So if you, if you or a studio
(17:54):
find stolen content on the on some website, the legal way that
you can you contact them is through the digital Millennium
Copyright Act DMCA. It's a specific form that you
send to them that's legally correct.
And then they have X number of of days to take content down
South. And there are there are
companies out there that search for your content and then send
(18:15):
these sites at DMCA. So Porn Guardian did that in the
studio world starting in 2011. And we we grew into being the
number one anti piracy company at the time.
And then when the fan platforms came out, we found a less
expensive packages to offer to individual models versus
studios. So I have a tremendous history
(18:35):
in anti piracy. One of the features of Porn
Guardian that I've put into the site is a watermarking feature.
So if you are experiencing piracy or you're an exclusive
model to, to just for fans, you have the ability to upload
movies into our digital watermarking system.
And what that does is embed digitally in a way that cannot
(18:56):
be removed information about whodownloaded the video from our
site and that's streaming or downloading.
And, and what that means is thatif you find your movie pirated
somewhere and you're able to download it, you can run it
through our decoder and we can figure out who on our site is
the person who downloaded it andthen uploaded it to these sites.
(19:19):
Because one thing that I think people may not realize is that
even if your scene is being pirated and it's now on 2000
different sites out there, that doesn't mean you were 2000
pirates. You had one pirate and that and
that scene propagated everywhere.
And so when people like back in the day when we were selling
porn guardian art wares, people like, oh, my scenes are
(19:40):
everywhere. This is too big of a problem to
to solve it. It's not because because the the
piracy moment where it actually happened was one guy.
Maybe it was two guys, but it wasn't 2000 guys.
And if we have the ability to identify who that guy is, he's
doing it to you and he's doing it to to 15 other people and we
can shut him down. And if he's.
(20:02):
In a in a jurisdiction where youcan sue him, we can help you get
the information required for youto then sue them.
Right. Yeah.
So that's. So we have so that, so that's a
huge thing that no other fan platform has.
No other fan platform has. So we have that.
Most of our movies you can't screenshot and you can't
download. There are some bugs in some
(20:23):
browsers where depending on the rotation, the format, that's not
true. But by and large, you can't
screenshot or screen record videos when they're playing.
And then porn guard in the company that I started, we, we
shut down three or four years ago because my business partner
in that passed away sadly. And I have hired some of the
staff from foreign guardian to work exclusively for just for
(20:44):
fans. So we have the people who are
searching for content, who are searching for, you know,
hundreds of studios content and what not.
They are now only looking for just for fans content all over
and submitting DMC as behind thescenes.
And we don't really talk about that, but there's there's
hundreds of thousands of videos that we've had removed without
sort of like making a big hooplaabout that.
Yeah, no, I, I have a template that I send out.
(21:06):
I mean, every once, every once in a while I get a bug up my ass
and I'm going to go search for my shit on the Internet and I
find it and it's, and I actually, I was because I was
wondering why is my, why is my site revenue down?
You know what I mean? Why is this going down?
And then I found somebody had ripped my entire website and it
was on gay torrents are you or gay-torrents.net or whatever and
had been downloaded thousands and thousands and thousands of
(21:28):
times. Oh my God it's literally all 600
videos from my website in one pack and.
It's terrible. So at the bottom of our site, in
the footer there's a report piracy link.
Or maybe it's on the left hand side.
I think it might be both. And so if you're a model or a
user who finds your content online, you can submit it to us
(21:49):
to tell us where it is. And those messages go directly
to the Porn Guardian staff so that they can go and go on the
hunt and and take a look for it and try to get it removed.
Is that included in that? That's not something that people
have to pay extra for. That's just included in it's.
Included. It's included.
That's amazing. Yeah, again, it's part of our,
it's part of our ethos, you know?
That's that's really, that's really, really amazing.
Well, that answers the next question that I was going to
(22:09):
ask. So the next one I was going to,
we'll transition to community and representation just for fans
of brands itself. As a queer sex worker LED space
in an industry often dominated by straight, sanitized content,
how do you keep queer voices, kinks, and creators front and
center? Well, I mean, yeah.
So, I mean, 90% of our, of our site is, is queer, you know,
queer models, we sponsor 20 to 25 events every month that are
(22:34):
all in the queer space. And we go to conferences
constantly and represent, and we've actually stopped going to
conferences that don't representus.
There's a, there's a few conferences that are very, very
straight focused. And as much as I keep trying to
get them to, to represent us more, they don't.
(22:55):
And at some point I, we just stopped sponsoring them and, and
told them very specifically why,Because every year we would
sponsor them and say, OK, this was good, but here's the things
that you're not doing for our community.
And they would promise to do it next year and they wouldn't.
And eventually was like, I mean,if you want our money, then,
then you, you have to do better.And so now we put our money more
into events that do represent us.
(23:16):
That's that's awesome. I can't imagine.
I can't imagine them doing like not wanting to have just for
fans that. Well, you know, I mean, the
straight side is so much bigger that, that some companies just
don't care because they're making so much money on the
straight side that to really, toreally speak to our community,
they need to hire somebody from the community to, to do that.
Otherwise it's straight people trying to, you know, pretend to
(23:38):
understand us and that's what you see.
So it just, it just doesn't workand, and they don't want to
spend the money because it's so little compared to what the
straight side brings in. And we, we also have our annual
conference, the just for fans annual conference, which in the
last few years has been in Palm Springs.
And we had like, I want to say like 450 models at this last
one. It was incredible.
(23:59):
And, and this last year we introduced.
So let me take a step back. So this conference, there's
expert panels every day. There's two days of expert
panels on various subjects. So social media marketing and
how to, how to translate followers, followers and your
subscribers and things like that.
And then we do other things likea tax expert explaining to the
(24:20):
models that they are in fact businesses and how to run a
business and what does that meanwith taxes and what's deductible
and how to structure your company and things, things that
maybe someone just doesn't know,you know, because this is the
first business that they've run or they don't realize that
they're a business. And so we we do that every year.
And this year we introduced affinity rooms where different
(24:41):
segments of our community had their own rooms to do mini
conferences. And this year we had a fetish
room and they programmed 2 full days of what does it mean to be
a fetish model? How do you succeed as a fetish
model? And they had live shoots where
they would demonstrate how to film certain things.
It was. It was.
Fantastic. Yeah.
And my friend Ryan Pup was, he did one of them, one of the
(25:04):
conferences or one of the panels.
He was so excited and I was so excited for him.
So it was like it was really cool to watch him gear up for.
That yeah, he did a great. We had a pop room that they were
amazing. We had a feather room that was
amazing. Like it was, it was, it was
fantastic and everybody who wanted to have sort of smaller
conversations within their segment of the community really
(25:24):
found it to be helpful and inclusive and just make
everybody feel like like their their niche in the industry was
important. What's really cool is that I
mean, a lot of people are going to be listening to this
interview, like the video portion is available on address
for fans and and my website and Spotify.
But a lot of people listen And if they could see the look on
your face when you talk about this stuff because you can tell
(25:46):
how like I have to imagine how, how cool it has to feel to see
something that you made as like a small idea just blow up.
I'm overly I'm overly like emotional and sentimental.
And if you ask my my team, like at these conferences, when I
walk around and see all of this working, I am constantly crying.
And it's, it's almost like gratuitous at this point, but
(26:08):
it's, but it's real because the Fed.
I can see it on your face. I can see just how excited you
you are about that stuff. It's it's amazing.
Especially the affinity room because this was my idea.
I'm always trying to figure out how to how to make things more
inclusive and how to have, how to have to foster more
conversations that maybe not everybody's interested in, but
but but provide space for the those who are.
(26:31):
And, you know, are they going towork?
Are people going to sacrifice their filming time to go and do
more sessions? You know, when they're here to
lay out in the sun or they're here to film and to and to walk
into these rooms and see 25 people, you know what?
Having these deep conversations.Yeah, that that it worked and
was incredibly meaningful. Good for you, dude.
(26:52):
That's like really fucking awesome.
Thank you. And I'm really like, just, I'm
happy to know you. I'm happy to have seen it grow
in the way that it has. It's it's very, very, very happy
for you. You've won multiple industry
awards and built a reputation asa leader in ethical adult tech.
So where do you think Just for Fans fits in the broader
conversation about sex work, censorship, or digital
ownership? You know, we're living in
(27:12):
difficult times right now, right?
I mean, things are tough right now politically.
And my, my fears are from sort of those external forces on us
and, and I and I wait for the day that we're going to be
targeted by the right. So I mean that it's, it's scary.
We, we do everything we can to represent the fact that we give
agency and autonomy to models, Ithink is scary.
(27:33):
What? Do you mean by that?
It's, it's, it's scary politicians, politicians need to
view us as victims because that makes their trafficking stories
make sense. And, and the minute that we're
not victims and that we have agency over our own bodies and
we're using it to make money as we want is a scary idea.
It is, I think, more scary for them when women do it because
(27:56):
they need to constantly view women as victims.
And the fact that women making alot of money on sites like mine
or, but more on only fans or demographic is more male based
scares the hell out of these politicians because it ruins
their narrative. You know, so they come after
they come after that because it doesn't fit.
I, I think the fact that we're mainly male presenting people
(28:17):
gives us a little cover because they're more, they're more
interested in and making sure that their narrative fits with,
with trafficking of women. But yeah, these things scare the
hell out of me. Like they don't want us to have
autonomy and agency. Yeah, that's, and that is, I
mean, I mean, I, I have friends that are other, they own their
own websites that are moving their websites all overseas and
stuff. They're they're hosting them in
(28:38):
other places. I don't know what I'm going to
do. I constantly try to think of
contingency planning for that, like if I have, I have residency
in Mexico, for example, I have, I have ideas about how to get a
passport in Europe if I need to,and then and move the whole
company overseas. Do I want to do that?
No, I think the next few years are going to be pretty rough.
So we'll see what happens. But I'm constantly, if there are
(28:58):
things that plagued me and keep me up at night, it's, it's that
and knowing that if something were to happen to my business
are hundreds of, I don't know, hundreds of thousands, but, but
10s of thousands of models who would get royally fun.
And so I'm, I'm, I'm very acutely aware and empathetic to
that and, and doing what I can to mitigate those risks.
It would be like that when only fans kicked off adult content
(29:20):
creators. But time.
But for real, it would be there would be a scary, scary day.
So let's pray for that to not happen.
And then they just continue glossing over you and you and
I's. 2020 was the year that I guess there was a major
migration happening as creators left only fans due to the
crackdown on fetish and king content.
I think that was 2020, right? I think it was.
(29:42):
God, I had to have to look back,but that's.
So it. Seemed there.
That seemed elite to me. But time flies, so perhaps.
Yeah, so, but many found a new home on just fans where the
boundaries didn't exist. So where where?
What did that surge teach you about the needs of fetish
creators or just content creators in general?
And how did it shape your visionfor the platform going?
Forward is, is that, was that the year when only fans said
(30:04):
that they were going to stop doing porn?
Was that? Was that also at the same time?
Yeah. Yeah.
That's kind of where the where, where it's going with that when
that. Happened.
That definitely was. Yeah.
That seems like it was 2020. That was a week.
Jesus Christ. I can only imagine what that was
like for you. Yeah, we, we ended up getting
five times the amount of trafficthat we normally get.
It was, it was, and I was on vacation.
(30:24):
I was like, I finally was like, I'm leaving my laptop at home
and I'm, I was, I went to Provincetown and I'm like, I'm
taking a vacation. I remember waking up and the,
the guy who ran the, the the B&B, the gay B&B that I was
staying at, who knew who I was said, Oh, I heard Onlyfans is,
is kicking people off and, and they had been slowly, slowly
(30:46):
kicking off fetish people. So it was the same time, I
guess, because I remember this in my, in my head and I kind of
thought that's what he was talking about.
And I was like, yeah, they're really cracking down and like
extreme fetishes. And he's like, no, I think
they're stopping Everybody was Oh, no, not because I feel like
I would have heard, but by then if, if that was had been real.
And then the minute I said that,my phone started blowing up and
(31:06):
I was like, what the fuck's going on?
And the server started getting really slow and I'm like, Oh,
Jesus Christ. And I had to cut my cut my
vacation early and I and I went back home like I either that I
think that day, if not, or maybethe next morning.
It was utter, utter, utter insanity.
But you know when people show you who are they, who they are,
believe them, right? Yeah.
Yeah, exactly. Well, I mean, and only only fans
(31:28):
did it once. I mean, they're probably, you
know, it's, it doesn't, it's notout of their realm to do it
again. But I mean, that's their core
money. I mean, again, you know, we
don't have to speak for other people, but it just seems like
shooting themselves in the foot.It was just shooting.
Themselves. When people show you who they
are, believe them. OK, so I want to just say thank
you again. I said earlier that I was back
on just for fans, so it's where I got my start returning is, you
(31:48):
know, I'm basically utilizing itas a kind of best of the videos
that I filmed over the last few years.
And I've been I'm out every weekon to on to just for fans.
So it's been a really effective way for me to reach my core fans
again when creators like me potentially leave or come back
after building their own platforms.
Do you envision just for fans complimenting individual brands
like mine? Is there a way for brands like
(32:09):
mine and yours to coexist together?
Yeah, I mean, I remember when you originally told me that you
were going off and doing your own thing.
I was excited for you, you know,and I and I did everything I
could to help promote you. I, I don't feel competitive
with, with these kind of ideas because I really feel that,
what's the phrase there? The rising tide raises all the
boats, you know, the more we cannormalize paying for porn and we
(32:31):
can normalize the fetishes. It's better for all of us, you
know, And so I, I remember beingvery excited and directing
traffic to your, to your site because I wanted you to succeed.
The whole point of a, of a site like just for fans is for models
to have agency and for models tomake the kind of money in this
industry that was only known to studios before.
And so it would be completely hypocritical for me to be like,
(32:54):
we want to have agency, but onlyagency under my control with us
and under my psych. Like that's, that would be a
very hypocritical, that would bea very corporate view of the
world that that, you know, perhaps other people would take,
but that's against my own philosophies.
I remember being so nervous to tell you like, I'm, I'm going to
migrate and do my own thing. I was so nervous to say
(33:14):
anything. But you were always, you were
always really cool. And so I just appreciate that a
lot. It's been cool to come back and
see it kind of grow again and get exposed to all these new
features that you've implementedsince the time I stopped.
Yeah. So, yeah.
So I was going to ask, what's next for Just for Fans, upcoming
features, technology improvements or initiatives
you're excited about? Yeah, I mean, look, we're
especially go ahead. Sorry I.
(33:35):
Was going to say any anything specifically kink centered or
anything like that but doesn't have to be so.
Well, so, so our out, our outreach is, is more and more
kink centered. So again, all these, these
events that we sponsor and the things that we go to more and
more, we lean into the kink sideto show our support and to make
sure that kingsters are aware ofwhat they can and cannot do on
our site. So, you know, features we build
(33:57):
are kind of features for everybody, but our, our outreach
is very, very much heavily lean toward the community and, and,
and, and we lean into that a lot, you know, so, so that will
continue. I'm constantly looking at the,
the user interface. I get a lot of people who, who
complain that the user interfaceis, it is complicated or there
or whatever. And there's this, this awful
(34:19):
difficult balance of, of how do you create new features while
keeping everything simple? Because yes, other other people
have simpler UIS, but they also have no features.
So they don't need to have a lotof UI.
So it's constantly trying to figure that out and, and try to
incrementally make things thingseasier to do.
So we'll we'll continue on that and see where the next year
(34:39):
takes us. Amazing, This has been awesome.
It was short and sweet. Thank you for your time.
Just Dominic, I just really appreciate you coming on the
show and giving me, you know, a little bit of time and the and
to talk to the community about what you guys are doing for for
Kingsters and and in general. This is this is the space for
people that are making fetish content on the Internet.
Well, first of all, thank you for having me.
I've known you for a million years.
(35:00):
So it's it's great to do this with you and great just to see
you again. And yeah, I would encourage
anybody who's listening or watching who who doesn't know
what events we do the first of every month on Twitter, we put
out our event calendar. So follow us on Twitter is our
XI guess is not I can't get usedto that, but it's I know just
just for the fans site is our Twitter and I the same on
(35:23):
Instagram and and the in the first week of every month, we
put out our full calendar for that month.
Again, like most of the events are, are are king focus, or at
least at least half of them I would say, but check come out
and there's links to to to find out more about the events and
and yeah, come in, come and say hi to.
Us awesome. Well you guys, this has been
episode 49 of Burlap's so I appreciate Dominic again, thank
(35:45):
you for coming on. If you guys are enjoying the
show, we are on Apple's Apple podcast, Amazon, Spotify and
YouTube video episodes go live on Spotify early for subscriber
access only and they're available on hungerff.com just
for fan slash hunger FF at 8:00 on Friday nights.
Audio goes live at 8:00 on Friday nights across all
platforms. And that's a wrap for this
(36:06):
episode. So thank you guys so much and
Dominic, I'll see you soon and I'll see you guys next week.
Take care. Thanks for going deep with me on
hunger FF presents prolapse. If you're loving the ride, hit
subscribe, drop a review and share the fisting glove.
Follow me on social media at hunger FF for unfiltered updates
and exclusive content. But until next time, keep it
raw, real and always hungry. I'll see you on the next
episode.
Welcome to Brolapse, the fistingpodcast that goes deep explore
my life, views and raw, unfiltered conversations with
the creators that are redefiningkink connection in the fisting
community. Hey, you guys, welcome back for
another episode of Brolapse. This is episode 49 and I'm
really excited about today's guest.
We have Dominic Ford, the owner of Just for Fans on Brolapse
today. So welcome, Dominic, Thank you
(00:22):
for coming on. Very excited to have you.
Thank you so much for having me,guys.
Yeah. No problems.
As I said, you're you've been inthe industry for.
A long time. Seven, I think 17 years, 18,
That's crazy. Maybe 18 years this next month I
think. If you've been in the industry
18 years, you we we started at the same time.
Yeah. That's crazy.
(00:44):
And here we are now like almost 20 years later.
So what I wanted to talk about today specifically was I wanted
to bring you on because just forfans as the biggest fan
platform, fan content platform on the Internet alongside the
other. But what I like about just for
fans is that it's such a positive space for fetish and
content fetish content creators.It's a safe space.
(01:06):
And so I really kind of wanted to talk a little bit about that
and just in general about like how just for fans came to be.
So I guess I'll start at the beginning.
You started just for fans around2018 two thousand and seventeen
2000 and. 18 Yeah. So we we launched the site on
Valentine's Day of of of 2018, so February 14th, 2018.
OK, awesome. So after that was after years of
(01:28):
running your own studio and performing in adult films.
So what inspired you to shift from being in front of the
camera to behind the camera to building a tech platform
specifically for sex workers? Yeah, so I, so I started
dominicford.com, which was a, a porn studio.
We filmed everything in 3D. It was pretty cool.
I, we, I started out in 2008 andthen so we've been, we were
(01:49):
around for quite a while before just fans.
So I mean studio kind of studio in general, studios were sort of
flatlining and user generated content and like amateur content
was the trend and, and it was before fan sites, it was the
trend. It was the trend on, you know,
xhamster and, and the, and the, the various tube sites.
Like it was very clear to me that that user generated content
(02:10):
was gaining traction and often times more interesting.
I remember we filmed some, so I'm in Fire Island right now.
We filmed something years ago onFire Island and it was beautiful
with, with the trees and, and the dunes and everything was
gorgeous. And I remember sending the
footage to my friends saying, take a look at this.
The pictures are so amazing. And they're like, yeah, but have
(02:30):
you seen this clip on like Pornhub or wherever it was?
And it was some guy in college jerking off in his poorly
made-up room with one IKEA torchin the corner.
He could barely see anything butBut there was this authenticity
about it and something taboo. I'm watching something that I
wouldn't see because it's private and they preferred
(02:52):
watching that to my gloriously produced thing.
Dude, do you have no idea how many times on this show I've
said that I've made an amazing piece of content that's
perfectly lit, perfectly framed,and it doesn't do as good as the
the videos of me in my bathroom fucking doing whatever?
It's crazy to me they don't. Right, so that happened.
This is long before Only Fans and the fan sites, but it was
(03:13):
just clear to me that there's anauthenticity that studios are
never going to have that this kind of content had.
And then when Only Fans came outand it was, it was clear that
they were geared toward the straight side.
And they also, they were not from the industry.
And I didn't really know what the industry didn't understand
the industry. Then when I came out, I was
like, OK, here, here's a, a goodidea for any number of reasons,
(03:35):
especially the financial benefits to the models that
studios don't provide and the agency that this kind of idea
provides. But I, I want to build one for
the, the gay side of the industry with an understanding
of that side of the industry andan understanding of the industry
in general and the ecosystem around it, which wasn't in our
competitor, for example. So I would go to these
conferences right there. There's adult conferences for
(03:57):
those who don't know every year.And always the topics of
conversation were piracy and tube sites and taking over the
world and what are we going to do?
Then later years, the conversation turned to a fear of
only fans because producers and managers and affiliates and
photographers, they're in our ecosystem, but they didn't have
(04:17):
a place in that platform to makemoney.
And so so the industry was afraid of that platform because
there weren't any inroads for most of the industry.
So when I built Just for Fans, Ivery specifically wanted to make
sure that there was a business model that included affiliates
and included managers and included all these things so
that everybody who was used to making money in the studio model
(04:39):
could make money on the fan model.
That's really amazing that you thought of.
I'd never even considered that when I when I was thinking about
this subject that that's something that had to have been
worked into it. That's really incredible.
So you coded the platform yourself?
Yeah, Correct. Yeah, I'm a software engineer by
trade. OK, that's amazing.
So and you remain deeply involved in its day-to-day
operation. So how has being the developer
(05:00):
and the sex worker shaped the way you built just for fans?
And does it impact how the site evolves over time?
Sure. I mean, so myself and all of our
staff is 100% staffed by sex workers.
And so we're all using the platform, you know, and so the,
the flaws that people see in theplatform, we also see and, and
the things that work, we also enjoy and, and we, and we're
(05:23):
building tools that we want to use to make our lives easier
and, and to make more money off the content that we produce.
So. And you're, you're always
introducing new features. They started seeing the
advertisements from other content creators showing up in
my feed and all that. Yeah.
Is that a? Yeah, that's new.
That's new as I don't remember when I launched it, but probably
new in the last six months anyway.
(05:45):
Yeah, Yeah. And it's doing gangbusters and
that's doing gangbusters. I was always afraid to launch
features that models had to pay for because it was really not on
my ethos to ever have models payfor anything.
But models kept saying, can you promote me?
Can how do I get promoted? And finally, I was like, okay,
well there are tons of ways thatthe site promotes you for free,
but but for those who are looking for extra, here's a way
(06:07):
to do it. And these ads are converting in
crazy high numbers, so I'm superexcited about it.
Amazing I am. That's really awesome.
I don't if you knew this but I started using my Just for Fans
page again. I'm thrilled.
I'm absolutely thrilled. So I'm actually updating it
again. So I'm gonna probably start
utilizing the advertise featurestoo, so.
Yeah. And that way I don't feel bad
about model spending money because they're making it,
(06:28):
they're making it back five foldor tenfold, you know, So it's
like it's like a little upfront,but investment, but it's coming
back to the models it almost immediately.
Nice, that's awesome. So just for Fans is run by
people like you said, who are sex workers or sex worker
adjacent. Why does that matter to you so
much? Is it just because of the
understanding that they have of the industry?
Or what do you think gets lost when adult platforms are run by
(06:49):
outsiders or corporate interests?
Yeah. So this is a core tenant of the
just for Fans ethos, if you will, like our, our, our
community building efforts is that everybody, everybody that I
hire is from the industry. Everybody.
I think everybody that works forus is now on camera or we're,
we're on camera. We hire them.
I think maybe there's one personwho manages pages and isn't on
(07:09):
camera, but but our entire customer service team and I
think there's ten of them now, they all come with, they all
come from people who had pages on our site.
And then when we look to hire, we put out a note to our model
base, say here's the position that we're looking to hire and
we hire from within that base. It is a core tenant.
It is incredibly important to mefor a number of reasons #1
(07:33):
they're models who use the site.And so again, if you, if you're
having a problem, odds are they've had the same problem or
they know how to fix it, or theyjust know a better way to to do
it that maybe you haven't figured out yet.
So there's that. And then there's always this,
you know, we're very stick, we're a very stigmatized group,
right? And you don't know when you're
writing into somebody for help if they're going to secretly
(07:54):
judge you or not take your side or assume that you're an idiot
because you're a model. And I think having models on the
other side that are treating youwith respect and treating you
with dignity and treating you from being within the fold makes
a overwhelming difference in howyou can communicate and
understand us as a company. Yeah.
And I will say that I always deal with Jeremy and he is
(08:17):
fantastic. I text message Jeremy at all
hours of the night sometimes. And I'm just like my friend from
Paris is having a difficult timewith this and he doesn't know
who to contact. And so your customer service
team is really amazing. Jeremy's incredible that they're
all amazing. And, and, and part of part of
the sort of built in thing wherethey're also models is that
they're, they're already passionate about the site and
(08:38):
they're passionate about the industry and they're passionate
about other models succeeding, You know, and, and I think that
if you had a random call center in, you know, whatever country
that call center is in, they don't give a shit about you.
You know, you're, you're, you'rean entity that makes them money
and that's how they treat you. And that's not how our team
(08:58):
treats models. That's very true.
And I've had a couple of, you know, a couple of issues and
I've had to deal with customer service with you guys and it's
been nothing. It's been always a a breeze.
It's been always a breeze. All right, let's so let's switch
gears a little bit and talk about the edition King
conclusion part of just for fans, which separates it from
only fans. So for those of you guys that
don't know, only fans is based in the United Kingdom.
I'm correct if I'm in memory serves correctly, and they have
(09:20):
some of the strictest obscenity laws on the planet, basically.
So there's a lot of things that are not allowed on only fans
that just for fans says, I guess, you know, obviously being
based here is allowed to includethat only fans can't.
So only fans has hard lines against fetish content,
especially fisting, but just forfans embraces it.
So what was the and I'll never forget.
(09:41):
We're not anti lapse. We are pro lapse.
I will literally never forget that.
It was so fucking funny. And So what were the biggest
challenges in creating a platform that allows the kinds
of content that most others won't touch?
So, so you're right in that geography makes a difference.
We are in the United States and and our competitors are not.
I would hasten to say that that's the only reason why there
(10:01):
are certain rules in other sites.
So like, yes, things are more strict in Great Britain, but I
think there are also internal rules that are going on in our
competitor sites that are made-up by them and not
necessarily by people above them.
But you know, you can ask, you can ask them to clarify that we
don't impose any rules internally other than what is
(10:22):
forced upon us. And the rules that we are forced
to implement come from the government and then and, and,
but more often or not than not, they come from the credit card
processing companies who are more strict than the government
typically is. So that's it.
And we work very, very closely with our banking partners
because there are rules that that are somewhat, sometimes
(10:44):
they're somewhat broad. And so to be like, OK, well,
here, here's the rule, but like,here's the specific instance
that a model wants to do. Does this really fit in there?
Or is it a Gray area or is it not a Gray area?
And we work very, very closely with our banking partners.
And every time something comes up, instead of us just denying
content outright like other people, other sites do, we'll go
to our banking partners and be like, here, here's what it is.
(11:06):
Where does this fall in the line?
And so we are constantly advocating for our models and
trying to to to more more narrowly slice our understanding
of what the rules. Are that's amazing.
I know the hoops I had to jump through when I started my
website for what I was able to create was all dictated by the
credit card companies. And so I had a couple of I had a
(11:27):
incidents where I was going to work with another management
company and my content was so extreme that they were were
concerned that their their chem sex website would be under fire
if they put my fisting content in the same umbrella category.
And I was like, so you're going to protect them and not give me
a chance? What the hell, man?
So have you. So I guess this sort of this
(11:48):
sort of piggybacks on the same thing.
Have you faced any payment processor issues or legal
friction from hosting content? Like, or have you, how have you
navigated those? Primarily through just
negotiating with the Yeah. So, so we haven't, but the
reason that we haven't is because we are so proactive
about about this. We don't leave anything to
chance. So we're constantly working with
the baking partners on everything that we do.
(12:10):
And so we haven't faced backlashbecause we're very, very close,
in close contact with them constantly.
So, so no, which is which has been great.
Great. Awesome.
So kink, this is kind of, this is interesting.
Kink content often walks a line between edge and ethics.
So a lot of times you'll see like some pretty like rough
stuff happening on the gang bangs and stuff like that.
(12:30):
Like what systems or principles does, does or France have to
ensure that content? Excuse me?
The consent, transparency and performer safety stay front and
center. It's it's a good question.
So we have our consent center, which is where a model uploads a
video and then has to get the consent form sign by every model
who's in it. We greatly encourage and I think
(12:51):
most kink studios do this. We greatly encourage producers
who are models who are creating the content to create some kind
of a pre roll, a pre reel where the models discuss what's going
on and what they're going to do.Just so that if there's ever a
question that arises, there is some video evidence that it was
known and consented to. Because if there is a a problem
(13:12):
that arises, we obviously have to take the side of of the
person who's questioning it unless there's documentation in
in some format. So I.
Just discovered about that the other day.
Say it again. I just didn't interrupt you, but
I just discovered that the otherday like that.
That's a thing. That's the industry like
standard in the industry now that they record the consent in
video format. I, I haven't, I haven't done
studio porn in so long and I have always just kind of done my
(13:34):
own paperwork or whatever. So I didn't know that that was a
thing until just Brian Bonds told me about that.
Just a couple weeks. Ago, yeah, especially with, with
sort of more fetish or extreme content studios like it's it's,
it's more and more important to have these kind of things
documented just in case something, some issues arise
afterward. Yeah, that's great.
It was. I thought it was really clever
and I'm probably going to start doing it.
(13:55):
Yeah, I mean even those for likethe people who who wear masks.
And so yes, you can you can weara mask in your video, but record
a pre roll where you're not in your mask so that we are a
hundred 100% sure that it is you, because what we don't want
is some kind of stolen content with somebody wearing a similar
mask to what you typically wear.You know, we so like what you
(14:16):
record for the public is is one thing, but then we need backup
stuff if problems arise. Right, that makes a ton of
sense. I always tell people that it's
for like consent forms and all that stuff.
It's for both of our protection.It's like, you know, it's for
it's for both of us. It's not just for me, for you to
Yeah, for fans was a response tothe one-size-fits-all model of
(14:37):
mainstream platforms. Is that fair to say?
Like and then So what features have you built specifically to
empower fetish creators, especially those doing high risk
content like fisting or a role play or anything like that?
Is there any features that have been implemented to
specifically, I guess not protect but for those types of
creators? Well, I'll, I'll tell you sort
of what we, what, what we do forthe fetish with the fetish
(14:59):
community features. I don't know if there's specific
features on the site, but external to the site, some of
the things that we do, for example, we've created a, a
chart of fetishes and what we allow versus what our
competitors allow. And, and we sponsor a ton of
events that are focused to the fetish community.
(15:20):
And at all of those events, we have this printed out in huge
form and then as takeaways so that the fetish community knows
exactly what the differences are, what we, what you can do on
our side or you can do on other people's sides.
And we have all of this on, on our side as well of what, what
content we are allowing don't allow.
But we really market this in the, for the fetish events that
(15:43):
we do know the Folsom St. and Dark Lands and you know, you
name it, King down South, we do so many of our events are very
finished focused. So when it comes to tools, I
think of not just like, like techie tools on the website, but
but what other tools are we providing that market, that
audience? And, and, and these are the kind
of things that that we're constantly showing face, we're
showing up, we're being present at these events and we're
(16:05):
showing you what you can and cannot do.
And half of our, you know, I told you, we talked about our
customer service team being 100%models.
At least half of them are fetishmodels, if not more.
In fact, maybe all of them, likeI'm all of them, but but at
least half that I can think of right now, they're all in the
fetish world. So like they're very, they're
very focused on this. Well, kink and fetish stuff is
(16:28):
getting more and more popular. There's this wave of, I mean,
especially with fisting, it feels there was a period of time
where it was the end of the roadsexual activity that you did at
the end of your porn career. And now it's just like people
are coming out of the gate at 18with all this.
I'm like what the? Fuck yeah.
Where do you go from there? From being the first Fister on
Just for Fans to the amount of fisters that are on just for
fans now. It's really it's crazy.
(16:49):
It's it's it's really. Yeah, the.
Community we have a just yeah and thank you I mean I mean you
are you are part of the reason that that we have that community
and we have a huge huge fisting community.
So thank you for for being the the trailblazer of that, but.
Do what I can say thanks for thanks for giving me a space
because you know, in the beginning, like I wasn't
monetizing my content. I was just giving it away for
free on X tube and then actuallyMacias von Fisenberg told me
(17:11):
he's like make money with your content.
Him and Howard from Fab Scout were both were like get on just
for fans. It's just started in there and
so I was on there and and the very, very beginning.
So time flies. So you've built a reputation as
a major anti piracy advocate on the adult, excuse me, in the
adult industry, what technologies or systems is just
for fans used to protect creators, especially those
(17:32):
making vulnerable or niche content?
So for those who don't know, well I started my porn company
in 2008, dominic4.com in 2000. I want to say 11 I started
another company called porn Guardian and what porn guardian
was and was a not just a DMCA service, which means, oh,
there's lots to explain here. So if you, if you or a studio
(17:54):
find stolen content on the on some website, the legal way that
you can you contact them is through the digital Millennium
Copyright Act DMCA. It's a specific form that you
send to them that's legally correct.
And then they have X number of of days to take content down
South. And there are there are
companies out there that search for your content and then send
(18:15):
these sites at DMCA. So Porn Guardian did that in the
studio world starting in 2011. And we we grew into being the
number one anti piracy company at the time.
And then when the fan platforms came out, we found a less
expensive packages to offer to individual models versus
studios. So I have a tremendous history
(18:35):
in anti piracy. One of the features of Porn
Guardian that I've put into the site is a watermarking feature.
So if you are experiencing piracy or you're an exclusive
model to, to just for fans, you have the ability to upload
movies into our digital watermarking system.
And what that does is embed digitally in a way that cannot
(18:56):
be removed information about whodownloaded the video from our
site and that's streaming or downloading.
And, and what that means is thatif you find your movie pirated
somewhere and you're able to download it, you can run it
through our decoder and we can figure out who on our site is
the person who downloaded it andthen uploaded it to these sites.
(19:19):
Because one thing that I think people may not realize is that
even if your scene is being pirated and it's now on 2000
different sites out there, that doesn't mean you were 2000
pirates. You had one pirate and that and
that scene propagated everywhere.
And so when people like back in the day when we were selling
porn guardian art wares, people like, oh, my scenes are
(19:40):
everywhere. This is too big of a problem to
to solve it. It's not because because the the
piracy moment where it actually happened was one guy.
Maybe it was two guys, but it wasn't 2000 guys.
And if we have the ability to identify who that guy is, he's
doing it to you and he's doing it to to 15 other people and we
can shut him down. And if he's.
(20:02):
In a in a jurisdiction where youcan sue him, we can help you get
the information required for youto then sue them.
Right. Yeah.
So that's. So we have so that, so that's a
huge thing that no other fan platform has.
No other fan platform has. So we have that.
Most of our movies you can't screenshot and you can't
download. There are some bugs in some
(20:23):
browsers where depending on the rotation, the format, that's not
true. But by and large, you can't
screenshot or screen record videos when they're playing.
And then porn guard in the company that I started, we, we
shut down three or four years ago because my business partner
in that passed away sadly. And I have hired some of the
staff from foreign guardian to work exclusively for just for
(20:44):
fans. So we have the people who are
searching for content, who are searching for, you know,
hundreds of studios content and what not.
They are now only looking for just for fans content all over
and submitting DMC as behind thescenes.
And we don't really talk about that, but there's there's
hundreds of thousands of videos that we've had removed without
sort of like making a big hooplaabout that.
Yeah, no, I, I have a template that I send out.
(21:06):
I mean, every once, every once in a while I get a bug up my ass
and I'm going to go search for my shit on the Internet and I
find it and it's, and I actually, I was because I was
wondering why is my, why is my site revenue down?
You know what I mean? Why is this going down?
And then I found somebody had ripped my entire website and it
was on gay torrents are you or gay-torrents.net or whatever and
had been downloaded thousands and thousands and thousands of
(21:28):
times. Oh my God it's literally all 600
videos from my website in one pack and.
It's terrible. So at the bottom of our site, in
the footer there's a report piracy link.
Or maybe it's on the left hand side.
I think it might be both. And so if you're a model or a
user who finds your content online, you can submit it to us
(21:49):
to tell us where it is. And those messages go directly
to the Porn Guardian staff so that they can go and go on the
hunt and and take a look for it and try to get it removed.
Is that included in that? That's not something that people
have to pay extra for. That's just included in it's.
Included. It's included.
That's amazing. Yeah, again, it's part of our,
it's part of our ethos, you know?
That's that's really, that's really, really amazing.
Well, that answers the next question that I was going to
(22:09):
ask. So the next one I was going to,
we'll transition to community and representation just for fans
of brands itself. As a queer sex worker LED space
in an industry often dominated by straight, sanitized content,
how do you keep queer voices, kinks, and creators front and
center? Well, I mean, yeah.
So, I mean, 90% of our, of our site is, is queer, you know,
queer models, we sponsor 20 to 25 events every month that are
(22:34):
all in the queer space. And we go to conferences
constantly and represent, and we've actually stopped going to
conferences that don't representus.
There's a, there's a few conferences that are very, very
straight focused. And as much as I keep trying to
get them to, to represent us more, they don't.
(22:55):
And at some point I, we just stopped sponsoring them and, and
told them very specifically why,Because every year we would
sponsor them and say, OK, this was good, but here's the things
that you're not doing for our community.
And they would promise to do it next year and they wouldn't.
And eventually was like, I mean,if you want our money, then,
then you, you have to do better.And so now we put our money more
into events that do represent us.
(23:16):
That's that's awesome. I can't imagine.
I can't imagine them doing like not wanting to have just for
fans that. Well, you know, I mean, the
straight side is so much bigger that, that some companies just
don't care because they're making so much money on the
straight side that to really, toreally speak to our community,
they need to hire somebody from the community to, to do that.
Otherwise it's straight people trying to, you know, pretend to
(23:38):
understand us and that's what you see.
So it just, it just doesn't workand, and they don't want to
spend the money because it's so little compared to what the
straight side brings in. And we, we also have our annual
conference, the just for fans annual conference, which in the
last few years has been in Palm Springs.
And we had like, I want to say like 450 models at this last
one. It was incredible.
(23:59):
And, and this last year we introduced.
So let me take a step back. So this conference, there's
expert panels every day. There's two days of expert
panels on various subjects. So social media marketing and
how to, how to translate followers, followers and your
subscribers and things like that.
And then we do other things likea tax expert explaining to the
(24:20):
models that they are in fact businesses and how to run a
business and what does that meanwith taxes and what's deductible
and how to structure your company and things, things that
maybe someone just doesn't know,you know, because this is the
first business that they've run or they don't realize that
they're a business. And so we we do that every year.
And this year we introduced affinity rooms where different
(24:41):
segments of our community had their own rooms to do mini
conferences. And this year we had a fetish
room and they programmed 2 full days of what does it mean to be
a fetish model? How do you succeed as a fetish
model? And they had live shoots where
they would demonstrate how to film certain things.
It was. It was.
Fantastic. Yeah.
And my friend Ryan Pup was, he did one of them, one of the
(25:04):
conferences or one of the panels.
He was so excited and I was so excited for him.
So it was like it was really cool to watch him gear up for.
That yeah, he did a great. We had a pop room that they were
amazing. We had a feather room that was
amazing. Like it was, it was, it was
fantastic and everybody who wanted to have sort of smaller
conversations within their segment of the community really
(25:24):
found it to be helpful and inclusive and just make
everybody feel like like their their niche in the industry was
important. What's really cool is that I
mean, a lot of people are going to be listening to this
interview, like the video portion is available on address
for fans and and my website and Spotify.
But a lot of people listen And if they could see the look on
your face when you talk about this stuff because you can tell
(25:46):
how like I have to imagine how, how cool it has to feel to see
something that you made as like a small idea just blow up.
I'm overly I'm overly like emotional and sentimental.
And if you ask my my team, like at these conferences, when I
walk around and see all of this working, I am constantly crying.
And it's, it's almost like gratuitous at this point, but
(26:08):
it's, but it's real because the Fed.
I can see it on your face. I can see just how excited you
you are about that stuff. It's it's amazing.
Especially the affinity room because this was my idea.
I'm always trying to figure out how to how to make things more
inclusive and how to have, how to have to foster more
conversations that maybe not everybody's interested in, but
but but provide space for the those who are.
(26:31):
And, you know, are they going towork?
Are people going to sacrifice their filming time to go and do
more sessions? You know, when they're here to
lay out in the sun or they're here to film and to and to walk
into these rooms and see 25 people, you know what?
Having these deep conversations.Yeah, that that it worked and
was incredibly meaningful. Good for you, dude.
(26:52):
That's like really fucking awesome.
Thank you. And I'm really like, just, I'm
happy to know you. I'm happy to have seen it grow
in the way that it has. It's it's very, very, very happy
for you. You've won multiple industry
awards and built a reputation asa leader in ethical adult tech.
So where do you think Just for Fans fits in the broader
conversation about sex work, censorship, or digital
ownership? You know, we're living in
(27:12):
difficult times right now, right?
I mean, things are tough right now politically.
And my, my fears are from sort of those external forces on us
and, and I and I wait for the day that we're going to be
targeted by the right. So I mean that it's, it's scary.
We, we do everything we can to represent the fact that we give
agency and autonomy to models, Ithink is scary.
(27:33):
What? Do you mean by that?
It's, it's, it's scary politicians, politicians need to
view us as victims because that makes their trafficking stories
make sense. And, and the minute that we're
not victims and that we have agency over our own bodies and
we're using it to make money as we want is a scary idea.
It is, I think, more scary for them when women do it because
(27:56):
they need to constantly view women as victims.
And the fact that women making alot of money on sites like mine
or, but more on only fans or demographic is more male based
scares the hell out of these politicians because it ruins
their narrative. You know, so they come after
they come after that because it doesn't fit.
I, I think the fact that we're mainly male presenting people
(28:17):
gives us a little cover because they're more, they're more
interested in and making sure that their narrative fits with,
with trafficking of women. But yeah, these things scare the
hell out of me. Like they don't want us to have
autonomy and agency. Yeah, that's, and that is, I
mean, I mean, I, I have friends that are other, they own their
own websites that are moving their websites all overseas and
stuff. They're they're hosting them in
(28:38):
other places. I don't know what I'm going to
do. I constantly try to think of
contingency planning for that, like if I have, I have residency
in Mexico, for example, I have, I have ideas about how to get a
passport in Europe if I need to,and then and move the whole
company overseas. Do I want to do that?
No, I think the next few years are going to be pretty rough.
So we'll see what happens. But I'm constantly, if there are
(28:58):
things that plagued me and keep me up at night, it's, it's that
and knowing that if something were to happen to my business
are hundreds of, I don't know, hundreds of thousands, but, but
10s of thousands of models who would get royally fun.
And so I'm, I'm, I'm very acutely aware and empathetic to
that and, and doing what I can to mitigate those risks.
It would be like that when only fans kicked off adult content
(29:20):
creators. But time.
But for real, it would be there would be a scary, scary day.
So let's pray for that to not happen.
And then they just continue glossing over you and you and
I's. 2020 was the year that I guess there was a major
migration happening as creators left only fans due to the
crackdown on fetish and king content.
I think that was 2020, right? I think it was.
(29:42):
God, I had to have to look back,but that's.
So it. Seemed there.
That seemed elite to me. But time flies, so perhaps.
Yeah, so, but many found a new home on just fans where the
boundaries didn't exist. So where where?
What did that surge teach you about the needs of fetish
creators or just content creators in general?
And how did it shape your visionfor the platform going?
Forward is, is that, was that the year when only fans said
(30:04):
that they were going to stop doing porn?
Was that? Was that also at the same time?
Yeah. Yeah.
That's kind of where the where, where it's going with that when
that. Happened.
That definitely was. Yeah.
That seems like it was 2020. That was a week.
Jesus Christ. I can only imagine what that was
like for you. Yeah, we, we ended up getting
five times the amount of trafficthat we normally get.
It was, it was, and I was on vacation.
(30:24):
I was like, I finally was like, I'm leaving my laptop at home
and I'm, I was, I went to Provincetown and I'm like, I'm
taking a vacation. I remember waking up and the,
the guy who ran the, the the B&B, the gay B&B that I was
staying at, who knew who I was said, Oh, I heard Onlyfans is,
is kicking people off and, and they had been slowly, slowly
(30:46):
kicking off fetish people. So it was the same time, I
guess, because I remember this in my, in my head and I kind of
thought that's what he was talking about.
And I was like, yeah, they're really cracking down and like
extreme fetishes. And he's like, no, I think
they're stopping Everybody was Oh, no, not because I feel like
I would have heard, but by then if, if that was had been real.
And then the minute I said that,my phone started blowing up and
(31:06):
I was like, what the fuck's going on?
And the server started getting really slow and I'm like, Oh,
Jesus Christ. And I had to cut my cut my
vacation early and I and I went back home like I either that I
think that day, if not, or maybethe next morning.
It was utter, utter, utter insanity.
But you know when people show you who are they, who they are,
believe them, right? Yeah.
Yeah, exactly. Well, I mean, and only only fans
(31:28):
did it once. I mean, they're probably, you
know, it's, it doesn't, it's notout of their realm to do it
again. But I mean, that's their core
money. I mean, again, you know, we
don't have to speak for other people, but it just seems like
shooting themselves in the foot.It was just shooting.
Themselves. When people show you who they
are, believe them. OK, so I want to just say thank
you again. I said earlier that I was back
on just for fans, so it's where I got my start returning is, you
(31:48):
know, I'm basically utilizing itas a kind of best of the videos
that I filmed over the last few years.
And I've been I'm out every weekon to on to just for fans.
So it's been a really effective way for me to reach my core fans
again when creators like me potentially leave or come back
after building their own platforms.
Do you envision just for fans complimenting individual brands
like mine? Is there a way for brands like
(32:09):
mine and yours to coexist together?
Yeah, I mean, I remember when you originally told me that you
were going off and doing your own thing.
I was excited for you, you know,and I and I did everything I
could to help promote you. I, I don't feel competitive
with, with these kind of ideas because I really feel that,
what's the phrase there? The rising tide raises all the
boats, you know, the more we cannormalize paying for porn and we
(32:31):
can normalize the fetishes. It's better for all of us, you
know, And so I, I remember beingvery excited and directing
traffic to your, to your site because I wanted you to succeed.
The whole point of a, of a site like just for fans is for models
to have agency and for models tomake the kind of money in this
industry that was only known to studios before.
And so it would be completely hypocritical for me to be like,
(32:54):
we want to have agency, but onlyagency under my control with us
and under my psych. Like that's, that would be a
very hypocritical, that would bea very corporate view of the
world that that, you know, perhaps other people would take,
but that's against my own philosophies.
I remember being so nervous to tell you like, I'm, I'm going to
migrate and do my own thing. I was so nervous to say
(33:14):
anything. But you were always, you were
always really cool. And so I just appreciate that a
lot. It's been cool to come back and
see it kind of grow again and get exposed to all these new
features that you've implementedsince the time I stopped.
Yeah. So, yeah.
So I was going to ask, what's next for Just for Fans, upcoming
features, technology improvements or initiatives
you're excited about? Yeah, I mean, look, we're
especially go ahead. Sorry I.
(33:35):
Was going to say any anything specifically kink centered or
anything like that but doesn't have to be so.
Well, so, so our out, our outreach is, is more and more
kink centered. So again, all these, these
events that we sponsor and the things that we go to more and
more, we lean into the kink sideto show our support and to make
sure that kingsters are aware ofwhat they can and cannot do on
our site. So, you know, features we build
(33:57):
are kind of features for everybody, but our, our outreach
is very, very much heavily lean toward the community and, and,
and, and we lean into that a lot, you know, so, so that will
continue. I'm constantly looking at the,
the user interface. I get a lot of people who, who
complain that the user interfaceis, it is complicated or there
or whatever. And there's this, this awful
(34:19):
difficult balance of, of how do you create new features while
keeping everything simple? Because yes, other other people
have simpler UIS, but they also have no features.
So they don't need to have a lotof UI.
So it's constantly trying to figure that out and, and try to
incrementally make things thingseasier to do.
So we'll we'll continue on that and see where the next year
(34:39):
takes us. Amazing, This has been awesome.
It was short and sweet. Thank you for your time.
Just Dominic, I just really appreciate you coming on the
show and giving me, you know, a little bit of time and the and
to talk to the community about what you guys are doing for for
Kingsters and and in general. This is this is the space for
people that are making fetish content on the Internet.
Well, first of all, thank you for having me.
I've known you for a million years.
(35:00):
So it's it's great to do this with you and great just to see
you again. And yeah, I would encourage
anybody who's listening or watching who who doesn't know
what events we do the first of every month on Twitter, we put
out our event calendar. So follow us on Twitter is our
XI guess is not I can't get usedto that, but it's I know just
just for the fans site is our Twitter and I the same on
(35:23):
Instagram and and the in the first week of every month, we
put out our full calendar for that month.
Again, like most of the events are, are are king focus, or at
least at least half of them I would say, but check come out
and there's links to to to find out more about the events and
and yeah, come in, come and say hi to.
Us awesome. Well you guys, this has been
episode 49 of Burlap's so I appreciate Dominic again, thank
(35:45):
you for coming on. If you guys are enjoying the
show, we are on Apple's Apple podcast, Amazon, Spotify and
YouTube video episodes go live on Spotify early for subscriber
access only and they're available on hungerff.com just
for fan slash hunger FF at 8:00 on Friday nights.
Audio goes live at 8:00 on Friday nights across all
platforms. And that's a wrap for this
(36:06):
episode. So thank you guys so much and
Dominic, I'll see you soon and I'll see you guys next week.
Take care. Thanks for going deep with me on
hunger FF presents prolapse. If you're loving the ride, hit
subscribe, drop a review and share the fisting glove.
Follow me on social media at hunger FF for unfiltered updates
and exclusive content. But until next time, keep it
raw, real and always hungry. I'll see you on the next
episode.
Popular Podcasts
NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal
Gregg Rosenthal and a rotating crew of elite NFL Media co-hosts, including Patrick Claybon, Colleen Wolfe, Steve Wyche, Nick Shook and Jourdan Rodrigue of The Athletic get you caught up daily on all the NFL news and analysis you need to be smarter and funnier than your friends.
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com