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Thursday, February 10, 2000

Email Luke

Paul Fishbein

I hear that Fishbein is funding Bryn Pryor's mainstream feature film. Fishbein has been wanting for years to get into filmmaking. Pryor served as the managing editor of AVN for a couple years under the name Mark Logan. He quit a month ago to shoot this film, written by several AVN staffers. AVN's new managing editor is a 22-year old from USC, "Ken Wood."

About two months after Luke reported it, and three months after Howard Stern, AVN.com and GeneRoss.com have finally covered the death of Chance Ryder.

Rob Spallone phoned at 4:18 PM.

Rob: "What are you doing?"

Luke: "I was taking a nap."

Rob: "Why are you busting Paul Fishbein's balls? Has he done anything to you?"

Luke: "No."

Rob: "Then why you gotta bust this guy's balls? I just turned on your site and I read he's a billionaire anal guy or something."

Luke chuckles. "I thought it would be funny."

Rob: "There's something wrong with you. You just like to bust people's balls."

Luke: "Yeah, you're right."

Rob: "Why?"

Luke: "Because he's my competition."

Rob: "But did he ever do anything to you?"

Luke: "No, never."

Rob: "That's not right. I don't understand you. I bother people who bother me. You bother people just to bother people. I mean, everyone thinks that I am a bad guy but you're a bad guy."

Luke: "You don't think it is funny."

Rob: "It was ridiculous."

Luke: "I was just trying to be cute."

Vivid producer Paul Thomas shot Kira at Rob's house today. One sex scene and five dialogue scenes.

Rob: "A beautiful Chinese girl."

Tuesdays With Morrie, Wednesdays With Rob

I spend Tuesdays with my dying journalism professor Morrie. He teaches me about love and forgiveness. Then I spend Wednesdays with Rob Spallone who teaches me other things.

I had lunch Wednesday with Axel Braun, son of Lasse Braun. Axel owns video stores in Italy, a food processing plant in CA and a leggy porn star girlfriend named Chelsea Blue.

He tells me about his visit to Brazil ten years ago where he was brought to an animal farm where animals were specially trained to have sex with humans.

Axel: "Anteater was the most shocking one..."

A couple of psychologists at the next table join in to the conversation and we discuss bestiality.

Axel: "It was south of Sao Paulo... A big farm with all kinds of animals, from the usual horse, dogs, and chickens... But the most shocking thing I remember was the anteater. The tip of their dick was square. Soft but square. And normal girls were doing this stuff. I saw a girl with an anteater. It shocked me... And they were charging a lot of money. Apparently there is a market for that stuff... I remember there were some people from Sweden and Norway there...

"We were there looking for a location to shoot an open air [porno]. Then they asked us if we needed animals. And we go, 'I don't know. In the setting maybe, why not?' Then they go, 'These are special animals...' And we don't know s--- about it... It was pretty disgusting. I've seen stuff. In America it is probably illegal just to have bestiality videos, but in Europe you can rent videos with bestiality. It is not a big deal. I've seen horses and stuff...

"My grandfather was in the Italian consul in Germany during World War II. So there's a picture of my father, Lasse Braun, at a year-and-a-half, in the arms of Adolf Hitler."

Two French journalists from Max magazine (France's best selling magazine, it resembles Maxim) are in town to write about the porn industry.

Nikola Acin is the journalist and Dimitri is the photographer. They talk like nihilists, come out of the punk rock movement from which they learned English, and have girlfriends back home.

Dmitri: "We have two rules. One, more than 2500 miles away..."

Nikola: "More than 2500 miles away, it is not cheating. So Las Vegas is ok, but Reno is too close [to home]. And blowjobs do not count as sex."

Luke: "Do your girlfriends know about these rules?"

Nikola: "Not really but we're trying to explain it to them very patiently."

Luke: "How's your HIV?"

Nikola: "I went to the doctor and he said that everything was positive..."

Nikola asks me about my favorite porn and I reply Rocco Siffredi, like his movie "Never Say Never To Rocco Siffredi."

Axel: "There were only three male performers who could sell porn. Rocco, John Holmes and Peter North (for his voluminous cum shot)."

I drove over to see a very angry Rob Spallone. He was annoyed by my comments yesterday linking Russ Hampshire and Paul Fishbein to his Babenet shooting house. Rob says that Russ and Paul have nothing to do with the shooting house.

I admit it was just something I made up.

Rob calls over a bodyguard.

Rob: "He might have to do a little strangulation, so have him around the door.

"Lukey, my father paged me. Did you read Luke F-rd? I don't read Luke F-rd. Well, you better read it. So what did he say? That you, Paul Fishbein, Russ Hampshire, Babenet, are all partners and that Kendra Jade is going on Howard Stern to promote the house. Why did you write that?"

Luke: "I must've been hacked."

Rob yellls: "You weren't hacked!"

Rob reaches for his gun, and slings it around. He opens up the chamber and unloads and loads the bullets.

Luke: "I was intoxicated."

Rob: "You don't get intoxicated."

Luke: "I'm sorry. I will never do it again. I just made it all up."

Rob: "We're going to play a little game. It's called Russian roulette. Me and you are playing. I'll go first."

Rob takes all the bullets out and puts the gun to his head. Pulls the trigger. Nothing happens. Then he puts a bullet in one chamber, and gives me the gun.

Luke: "No, no, no. I'm sorry. I will never do it again. I made a mistake."

Rob: "Why Luke?"

Luke: "I thought it would get more hits for your site."

Rob: "What do Russ Hampshire and Paul Fishbein have to do with me?"

Luke: "I thought they'd like to read their names on my site."

Rob: "No, they don't like to see their names on there. All Paul did for me was put me in contact with the people I am partners with. My partners are Larry Fields from Fat Dog and Babenet. Those are the partnerships. Paul helped me out a lot. If I make a billion dollars, I'll help him out because he gave me contacts. He don't want nothing. He has nothing to do with this. Russ Hampshire has nothing to do with this."

Kendra Jade, one of Rob's porn girls staying at his porn house off Sunland, wanders into his office.

Rob: "We're playing Russian Roulette. Me and Luke. I need you out of the office."

Luke: "Can't I get a hug?"

Rob: "Yeah, it will be your last hug. Better yet, f--- him."

Kendra says no.

Rob: "He might be dead."

Luke: "Kendra, this is my last request before I die. Kendra, will you have sex with me?"

Kendra: "No."

Rob: "Lukey."

Luke: "My sources gave me bad information."

Rob: "There were no sources. You decided to make things up to stir the s---. Where are my cigarettes? Kendra, give me cigarettes. And it was real dumb."

Luke: "I'm sorry."

Rob: "The Bo thing is all straightened out now."

Luke: "Did I help? At least provide a forum whereby differing parties could exchange their views?"

Rob: "I spoke with Bo. Bo doesn't want no headaches and no problems. He just wants to get out of this. And he doesn't want to lose the $14,000 he has invested. I am not a scumbag. I am going to give him his money back. He paid $10,000 and change for the movie. I'm going to give him the money back and I own the movie. $5000 is owed by Kendra Jade. Which we will pay him. Then he will give her a release from the contract so he can't sue nobody who deals with her. Because Craig [Vasiloff of FANtastic] is going to sign her. That's number two. Number three is number one. Why did you do that?"

Luke: "I thought it would create more buzz."

Rob: "It didn't create more anything. It was just dumb. Now I've got people [Paul Fishbein, Larry Fields] calling me, saying, 'Listen, why do you deal with f---ing Luke? All he does when he has nothing to do is that he prints trouble for you. We will not do that to you. Gene Ross will not do that to you."

Luke: "Gene will screw you. He will just make things up."

Rob: "No, that's Luke... Don't touch the computer... Does Gene put things up as first as you? I want to show you that I know how to use the computer..."

Rob boots up the laptop computer all by himself.

Rob: "That was so dumb Lukey. Now I think that we should have a Gene Ross and Luke F-rd night..."

Luke: "No. I want my own show."

Rob: "Luke, I planned to help you make a lot of money... Shut this off."

I have to turn off my tape recorder while Rob gives me scoop that would make your mind spin.

Rob: "Luke, this is the first time I've ever been really mad at you."

I hear that Bo has called in his powerful contacts [like Paul Fishbein, who does a lot of business with John Kenney aka Bo] around the industry who in turn phoned Rob to get him to make nice with Bo.

Kendra Jade: "Howard Stern on Monday is going to play 'Who Wants To Be An Anal Billionaire.' If they answer the questions right, they get to have anal sex with me."

Luke: "I'm going on the show. I want to win. I'll come with you to New York and look after you."

Rob: "Bo don't deserve to lose all that money... It's resolved. Nobody gets beat up, nobody gets threatened [Bo threatened to beat Rob up a couple of weeks ago]. And nobody has to go to lawyers."

Luke: "Is it true that Bo was high on cocaine in Las Vegas last month?"

Rob: "I couldn't tell you."

Luke: "Is it true he wanted Kendra Jade to spend the night with him in his hotel room?"

Rob: "I couldn't tell you."

Luke: "Is it true that he wanted Kendra Jade to suck his dick?"

Rob: "He said that because he was mad. You wanna hear the tape?"

Luke listens to phone messages of Bo abusing Kendra, telling her to suck his dick and to shove their contract up her ass.

Luke makes notes to himself: "Don't write that Rob put a gun to my head... And don't print that Rob said don't print that Rob put a gun to my head. Because I put the gun to my head. I felt bad that I had made up defamatory and patently untrue statements about Paul Fishbein and had impugned with no factual basis the integrity of Adult Video News."

Rob tells Luke: "All I do is bulls--- to get people to read my f---ing site."

Luke: "All I do is bulls--- to get people to read my f---ing site."

Rob: "Because I am a dick."

Luke: "Because I am a dick."

Rob: "And a cunt."

Luke: "And a cunt."

Rob: "Like Eli of All Good Video."

Luke: "Like Eli of All Good Video."

Rob: "Eli owes me $1500. He told me he was going to send it to me and he never sent it. I'll run into him again.

"Larry Fields from Fat Dog is my partner and Babenet is our provider. That's it. Russ has nothing to do with and neither does Paul."

The URL for Rob's shooting house is http://www.realpornworld.com.

Luke: "Various element of l-keford.com are at war with each other. Contrary to the report at the top page of the page, Paul Fishbein and Russ Hampshire will not be appearing on the Howard Stern Show Monday with Kendra Jade."

Luke to Rob: "Can I come visit Haley and Dynamite and Kendra in the morning?"

Rob: "If you learn how to behave, you can come here and f--- them as much as you like... But if you don't learn how to behave, I'm not talking with you anymore. Why must you think that these people are my partners? In the beginning, I was hoping to do something with Paul [Fishbein] and he couldn't do it because he has people in the business he does business with, and it wouldn't be good. Not dealing with me. He just can't be involved with these people in the video business. Because that's what he does for a living. Conflict of interest. He set me up with people who helped me do this. That's all Paul did for me."

Luke: "Does he get a consulting fee?"

Rob: "I wanted him to be a partner but he said he can't."

Luke: "Did he ever come over and try to sleep with any of the women here?"

Rob: "No, his wife is beautiful. That would be like me wanting to sleep with the women. He's got a beautiful wife [Kymberly Wilson, head of cable sales at VCA]."

Luke: "He does. She's really hot."

Rob: "A nice lady. Very nice."

Luke: "She's so hot."

Rob points to Sopornos posters on the wall.

Rob: "She gave me all that."

Luke: "What else did she give you?"

Rob: "That's it."

Luke: "Do you think she's really hot looking?"

Rob: "She's a pretty woman."

Luke: "She is a pretty woman."

Rob: "Classy."

Luke: "Classy lady."

Rob: "And he's a smart motherf---er."

Luke: "And he's a smart motherf---er."

Rob: "And a f---ing workaholic."

Luke: "And a f---ing workaholic."

Rob: "I'm glad that Bo called to straighten this all out today."

Luke: "So am I. Is he going to sue me?"

Rob: "For what?"

Luke: "Defamation of character?"

Rob: "Someone should kill you. They shouldn't sue you. If everybody in this business said 'Rob, here's $25,000. Make Luke F-rd go away. Then you go away.' I would take the $25,000 from everybody. Make you go away and then I would leave. I wouldn't even be in this business anymore."

Luke: "Sounds like a plan."

Kendra's on Rob's mobile phone.

Rob yells at Kendra: "Is this a long distance call by any chance? No one listens to me around here."

Haley grabs something and walks away.

Rob: "Hey you, you don't take things out of my office... No excuses."

Luke: "Haley, how did you run into this man?"

Haley: "[At CES] I asked him if he knew where I could get a battery for my cell phone. And he says, 'Do you know who the f--- I am? I'm Rob f---ing Spallone.' I go 'Ok, so? What's that supposed to mean?' He said, 'What's your name?' I said 'Haley.' He said, 'Here's my card. Come to California and live in my house for free. You can work for whoever you want to work for...' Which hasn't happened yet.

"He said to me, 'Have you ever watched Sopornos?' I said, 'Sopranos.' But anyways..."

Luke: "Do you think Rob is a member of the Mafia?"

Haley starts laughing.

Haley: "I doubt it. And I have no comment either."

Luke: "Has he ever tried to take your virtue?"

Haley: "What?"

Luke: "Has he ever propositioned you sexually?"

Haley: "No, not him himself. Not for him. He does tell me to go f--- other people or suck their dicks."

Luke: "He encourages you into sexual promiscuity?"

Haley: "Yeah, he says 'On your knees.' He just told me a second ago to drop naked, go into the court and do pushups."

Luke: "Do you feel ruined?"

Haley: "If I ever did any of those things, yeah."

Rob talks to Craig Vasiloff on the phone: "Kevin called up and says that Bo called him and wants Kevin to stay out of it. Bo wants his lawyers to handle it. Larry Fields from Fat Dog calls up. 'Rob, we've got to think of a way to stop this. Don't fight this out. Bo does a lot of business with me... Five minutes later, Bo calls up. I say, 'Wait, before you say a word. You called me and threatened me. I didn't threaten you. I waited here for you. If you want to do it streetway, we'll do it streetway. You want to run to the cops like a cunt and take it to lawyers, we'll take it to lawyers.' So we talked for 20 minutes... If Kevin don't want it, I'll sell it to you..."

Rob says goodbye to Craig and then yells at Kendra and I who are chatting with Vasiloff via AOL.

Rob: "How are you talking to Greg if I just spoke to him? He was on the computer while he was talking to me?"

Kendra: "Yeah."

Rob: "He wasn't taking me serious?

"So, I've got to come up with another $15,000 by Monday [to buy the Kendra Jade - The Whore movie from Bo]."

Rob turns to the two porn girls who live at his shooting house.

Rob: "Dynamite, go do some scenes. Haley, go do some scenes. When you're done with your porno work, you get on the corner and bring me the money."

The girls protest.

Dynamite says she's going to do bukkake.

Rob: "Who says you're going to do bukkake? They're teasing you.

"Luke, find out why Sharon Mitchell switched blood labs again?"

Rob sits down with Kendra.

Rob: "Ok, this Greg... We can't talk with that thing on."

I have to turn off my taperecorder as Kendra and Rob go over the contract offer faxed them by FANtastic. It asks a lot of Kendra, one week a month doing this, doing that, blah, blah, blah... Vasiloff is really going to get his pound of flesh.

I talk to director Rod Fontana who's shooting "Leg Sex Fantasy 4" and "Ass Wrecked 5."

Luke: "Do you think that these films promote violence against women?"

Rod: "Absolutely not."

Luke"With a name like Ass Wrecked, isn't that an underlying theme of violence against women?"

Rod: "No more than Fresh Meat."

Luke: "I think there's a correlation between pornography and cigarettes. When he shoots, Rob smokes four packs a day."

I wander into Rod Fontana's foot fetish shoot.

Rod directs the man: "Could you cum on her feet? And have the foot swinging at the camera, to make it look big. Foot fetis---s like that."

Dynamite: "Are you one of them?"

Rod: "Not me. I don't understand this."

At the end of the scene, cameraman and gaffer Mickey Ray moves on to light the next scene with Tony Everready, a man of color, and Mia, a 57-year old white Russian woman.

Mickey: "We'll need extra lighting for Tony..."

Trisha aka Ashley Shye is offered a joint by several porners smoking the weed. They're trying to hide it when I, the guardian of the conventional morality, walk up. Trisha, a dental assistant, says she's never even smoked a cigarette, let alone marijuana.

Gali writes: Luke, you meet most of the people in porn today, let me ask you this. Is ANYONE in porn actually intelligent anymore? I'm not talking Mensa candidates, but judging by the writing, interviews, comments, etc. these people seem Forrest Gumpian in the mental department. (speaking of which, I hear a scene from Forrest Gump was cut out where he plays Harry Reems' cock in Deep Throat) I'm asking because in porn's heyday, many of those people were intelligent, articulate folks who cared about what they were doing. The Hedgehog, Gillis, John Leslie, Sprinkle, even Rio and Seka, all seemed like reasonably intelligent folks. But your interview with Fishbein? I'm sure he's a nice guy, but SHEESH! I know porn isn't the kind of industry to attract philosophy majors, but still... These people seem like NIMRODS! Tell the truth Luke, am I right? Ever feel like you're swimming in a sea of retards? Still though, they sure can f---.

  1. Image:0002091
    James Bonn, Haley at Rob Spallone's shooting house

  2. Image:0002092
    Trisha and co

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    Lori Michael's boyfriend

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    Haley

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    Trish and co for Rod Fontana

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    Trish and co

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    Trish aka Ashley Shye

  8. Image:0002098
    Trisha

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    Trish

  10. Image:00020910
    Trish

  11. Image:00020911
    Trisha

  12. Image:00020912
    Trisha

  13. Image:00020913
    Trisha

  14. Image:00020914
    Trish

  15. Image:00020915
    Trish

  16. Image:00020916
    Mia, a 57-year old Russian discovery of Rod Fontana's


  17. Image:00020917
    Mia
  1. Image:00020918
    Mia

  2. Image:00020919
    Mia

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    Rob Spallone vs Luke's tape recorder

  4. Image:00020921
    Haley

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    Kendra Jade

  6. Image:00020923
    Kendra

  7. Image:00020924
    Haley

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    Rob Spallone

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    Dynamite

  10. Image:00020927
    Dynamite

  11. Image:00020928
    Tony Michaels

  12. Image:00020929
    Tony, Guy DeSilva

  13. Image:00020930
    Kendra Jade sucks a fag

  14. Image:00020931
    Kendra smokes

  15. Image:00020932
    Luke at Kendra's computer

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    Rob Spallone's guns

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    Rod Fontana

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    French journalists from Max magazine, Dimitiri and Natilov

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    French

  20. Image:00020937
    Haley, Rod Fontana

Luke Gets Mail

Serious in Modesto: Is it me or is Kendra Jade looking more and more like Peg Bundy from Married With Children? Kendra your plastic surgeon owes you a refund.

Helpful in Modesto writes: Luke - This loser will pay $ 25,000 (searchingforher.com) to the individual most responsible for hooking him up with a wife! Email him Kendra Jade's phone number quick and for God's sake don't mention: her shameful Jerry Springer rendezvous, her multiple plastic surgeries, her checkered porn career, or her Bunny Ranch stint. Your money worries are over! Now dump those stupid ad banners.

Rumdar: Luke...Just how does one pronounce the name Chaim Amalek? Would you please "sound" it out for us?

Luke: HI-yim Ah-Mah-lek.

DrSuzyBlock.com writes: This Saturday, February 12, 2000, starting at about 10 PM (PT), the topic of The Dr. Susan Block Show, will be "Shakespearean Sex," featuring University of Massachusetts English professor and author of Unspeakable Shaxxxspeares Richard Burt. Other guests on the 2.12.00 show include Maya Divine and Kiss, and, as always, callers from around the world.

Talking Blue

Look for the story on Jenna Jameson and Dave Michaels interview with Julia Ann.

Ryan writes: hey luke, how are ya??love the site..i wanted to share something with the crowd..i see the allmighty JENNA JAMESON blew the spearmint rhino off again! she blows off every club in america..she always as some lame medical excuse.i was supposed to see her in west palm beach and jenna calls the club and says she was in a scuba accident.haha i wish a shark attacked and killed her!! its no secret that steve chase (her booking agent) has to beg clubs to get her gigs,some clubs want deposits to book her.jenna thinks she is as big as she used to be!its so sad,she doesnt even realize it..everyones tired of her lies,backstabbing,ego,and all the other bulls--- that jenna slings..janine recentley told me and my friend when we talked to her,that jenna has f---ed over too MANY PEOPLE AND SHE SHOULD JUST MARRY HER SUGAR DADDY AND GO AWAY! janine is someone with beauty and class...jenna can try to convince everyone all day long that shes bigger than porn,and that shes a model and a huge crossover in acting..hahahahahaha i think jenna should try stand up now,shes the funniest joke around.

Goddess writes: Luke, Doesn't it worry you EVEN SLIGHTLY that the picture of you on your news page looks like you have a bullseye on your head? Maybe your boss is trying to tell you something??? Just some food for thought.

YNOT Gossip

From Ynotnetwork.com, the premier moderated posting board for porn webmasters:

JohnIP writes: "I want to have an open discussion with Sponsors about the value of advertising for a moment.We as sponsors are constantly under discussion on these Webmaster Resource Boards about our credibility,reputation and reliability...and that’s only right. But Id like to see some sort of independent assessment of these webmaster resources and there measured value to a sponsor. Rates while competitive on these sites have no real measured reference of success. Now I understand Branding and I have as much “Stupid Money” (thanks Amber;) to throw against the wall on these sites as the next guy but I’m looking for input and commentary from past experience and an open Sponsor discussion on how we all can better manage those advertising dollars generically and specifically. Of course open input from board owners with proposed ways to set themselves apart with this kind of service to their advertisers is welcome as well."

YNOT and SexTracker.com owner Andrew Edmond responds: "We are working on an ranking system for adult sponsorship programs that will be released at the end of this month, maybe a little sooner. The way it works is this: Fifteen "major player" panelists, those that represent all that is good about the adult internet will be nominating and voting on "ultimate" sponsorship programs, that is sponsor programs that pay out every time, on time; have been around for more than a year; that has an extremely favorable reputation; and have "given" back to the adult webmaster community on some demonstrable level.

"The first list that is generated will be 10-15 "excellent sponsor programs", with the ability to nominate your own sponsor program to the panel for a vote the next month. More details will come closer to release date, but this is all I can say for now. YNOT has about four major new service announcements coming out just this month that are aimed objectively to fix problems such as the one you are suffering from within the community. We can't wait to release them, and are working nearly 24 hours a day in development!

"YNOT is totally rebuilding it's advertising structure over the next two months. At SexTracker, we recognized instantly when we first opened two years ago that traffic can be measured in innumerable ways... niche preference, sexual orientation, originating country, monitor size... every visitor that comes to SexTracker is very well known by the time they get to the site and we only sell our advertisers traffic that we can put an exact advertising measurement on (and that they can use to make lots of money from!).

"Most of the other webmaster resources run blanket or brand advertising campaigns, and since our aquisition of YNOT, we will be lending our traffic filtering and sorting technology to the sponsors of YNOT in order to increase value so that advertising placed on YNOT will have a measurable result to your bottom line. So, for all YNOT advertisers, auction bidders, and daily visitors, YNOT has a very sophisticated future coming up that will bring more value to all our interested users in ways that matter directly to them."

Porn Nazi writes this warning about www.sextowers.com: Here is the initial letter he sends out, I have talked to 5 other webmaster who were gonna do business with him, luckily 3 got to stop payment and the other 2 didn't send him anything..He took us for high 5 figures:(, heres the message to beware of..

CORY468@aol.com wrote: > Im Cory the Business Development manager at www.sextowers.com. Our site gets > over 120,000 uniques per day and stats can be seen at sextracker.com. Im > writing to you to offer you our great advertising rates now available. We > have our webmaster resource section spot available for only $300 for the > entire month. We have over 1000 adult webmaster members and get 5-10 new > signups everday. If you want to advertise to the surfer we can sell you > signups at a rate of at least 10 a day. Please email me for further info if > your interested. Thanks Cory

******************************** thing is, is that all the info for sextowers.com has changed 2 days ago? he sold it? switched his name to another one? watch out guys, this guy is the lowest scum of the earth and takes hardworking webmasters for all their worth..Bad thing is, is I had others peoples cash in with mine so I'm having to scrounge to get that worked out..f---er..

Steve writes on Netpond: I have avoided signing up with sponsors that use Epoch for the past few months. They pay the paysites, and string the advertisers along like dumb ass sheep. The smart paysites are now getting "2nd" processors, and some are even starting pay per sign-up programs. If you want to know why, try not paying your bills for months on end, see what happens. I am tired of looking at decent numbers on the stats page, and peanuts in my mailbox. The traffic goes to paysites who pay me.

 

Adult Consumer Reports.com Threatened

From: "Wintman, Wendy"
To:(mross@calweb.com)(support@calweb.com)
Sent: Wednesday, February 09, 2000 1:18 PM
Subject: File#NC1881

To: Michael Ross

re: your website http://www.adultconsumerreports.com (http://www.adultconsumerreports.com)

I am Wendy Wintman, Copyright Manager at Consumers Union of U.S., Inc., the nonprofit publisher of CONSUMER REPORTS magazine. As you are probably aware, CONSUMER REPORTS and our logo, are federally registered trademarks, and the material contained in each issue of the magazine is copyrighted and protected by copyright law.

You have chosen to name your web site using a federally registered trademark, and using our domain name: Consumer Reports. You did not seek permission to use our name on your web site and had you requested permission, it would have been denied. Use of our name that deceptively or falsely misrepresents our findings or which creates confusion infringes our rights under the Lanham Act, 15 U.S.C. ?? 1 et seq.

Such uses may also contravene our rights under state laws prohibiting false advertising and other unfair trade practices. Indeed, you are 'rating' products and using our good name and reputation to attract people to your site; a site with which we are not at all connnected.

We have learned of your use through the eyes of our faithful readers. We are just as concerned as the consumer because this is clearly not in line with the type of products CU tests and evaluates. We are a family magazine, not an adult magazine and do not have a separate product that is solely for adults, as your web site intimates..

Furthermore, Consumers Union never permits the commercial use of our name or material. I have attached a copy of our no-commercial use policy to the bottom of this letter. We hereby demand that you immediately remove our name from your web site and eMail me at the address below with your agreement to comply with this request. Should you have any questions, please eMail me at wintwe@consumer.org

If we do not hear from you within the next five business days (no later than Wednesday, February 16, 2000) we will forward this file to our attorney for further action. Thank you for your anticipated cooperation.

Sincerely, Wendy J. Wintman, Copyright Manager Consumers Union of U.S., Inc. 101 Truman Avenue Yonkers, NY 10703 wintwe@consumer.org voice. 914.378.2448 fax: 914.378.2946

Sin City Fires Nikki Fritz

Sin City fired Marketing Director Nikki Fritz last Monday, January 31st. At the end of the work day, she was brought into Mark Snyder's office. He's the Sin City Art Director. And she was told that she was no longer needed. She was offered a consulting deal, I hear, and she turned it down. She's now doing web design work from home.

About a month ago, at CES, Fritz was threatened with firing by Sin City for talking to me.

A Sin City Source writes: "Luke, you old son of a gun. How's life. Oh, I forgot, you don't have one. Just kidding. You are correct in that she is no longer working for Sin City. Her expertise was in web design, not marketing and SCV needs marketing people, not web designers. I have also decided to redesign the web site in San Francisco using an established design company not in the adult business to attain an un jaundiced, fresh look and feel. Sincityvideo.com is also digitizing their entire line for broadband, pay per view by movie or by scene or a group of scenes can be searched by genre and seen without having to join the membership club. We are currently building the best site on the web, bar none."

Rob Spallone said Thursday night that he'd talked to Bo and made peace with the owner of LGI Distributors.

Yadda: MC chargeback policy will force adult sites to stop recurring billing. Accept it, live with it. It is the future. Recurring was always a rip off. Most members didn't know they were being rebilled. We got fat by ripping people off. Now it stops.

Laura Day: Redundancy is having multiple systems that can operate independent of each other, so if one system goes down, the other(s) continue providing service.

Here's a defination of redundancy from The Web Dictionary of Cybernetics and Systems. The variety in a channel that exceeds the amount of information actually transmitted. Its most common forms: (1) repetitive transmission of the same message over one channel, (2) duplication of channels, of which each could handle the transmission by itself, (3) restrictions on the use of characters or on the combinations of characters from an alphabet to form proper words or expressions (see language), (4) communicating something already known to its addressee. In the process of communication redundancy is essential to combat noise, to assure reliability and to maintain a communication channel. English writing is estimated to be 50% redundant which accounts for the ability of native speakers to detect and correct typing errors. Parity checks, which are common in communication within computers, enhance reliability but only at the expense of using additional channel capacity. The amount of information actually transmitted is not increased by this device. Similarly, Indian governments of the Mogul period are known to have used at least 3 parallel reporting channels to survey their provinces with some degree of reliability, notwithstanding the additional efforts.

Frankel writes: On the subject of UUNET, a few corrections: from Feb 8 "A CEN official writes on Netpond: CEN sites are back online. Currently we have 4 blocked sites: privategold.com xxxasians.com badgirlsclub.com sexcenterfolds.com Sites are only blocked when you access them through a UUnet connection. AOL users etc. can hit the sites". This CEN official obviously doesn't know s--- about s---, since AOL gets its connectivity from UUNET.

And on the subject of retaliation DOS attacks and a possible conneciton to UUNET's actions: if it is retaliation, then the "hackers" should pull their head out of their ass, so far the big guys hit have all been customers of globalcrossings, not UUNET. Don't believe the hacker hype, this is a basic DOS attack that shows globalcrossings needs to get up to spped on configuring their routers, CISCO has been telling anyone who wants to listen how to do this. Try a better conspiracy theory, like the fact that Clinton asked for big bucks in the state of the union to combat cybercrimes. Now we have a lot of cybercrimes and the FBI is getting ready to come to the rescue as soon as we pass legisaltion to give them more cash and the right to snoop on people's PC's.

Mike South writes: I was thinking last night about the recent denial of service (DOS) attacks on ebay, yahoo and others. As I did so something came to mind, all of these sites are HUGE and are geared up to handle a very high volume of incoming requests. These DOS attacks were NOT instigated by teenagers on home pCs, these had to come from computers capable of far more requests than you can generate on your home PC, even with a cable modem. Then I remember Clinton wanting more money and authorization to "combat internet crime" and pry into your privacy, all in the name of combating crime. Coincidence? I doubt it.

Click Here to signup now. P.S. CyberErotica is also the most POPULAR premium site on the net.

Brian Shuster Layoffs

Shlomo: Yeah, I'm one of the former employees that just got the shaft from Brian Shuster. Just waited 5 minutes before the end of the day and axed everyone, except a few kiss ass's. Didn't care about people with family's, no severence, no warning, nothing, then turned around and left the questions up to his HR people. sucked.

Baduncle: Hey Luke I just wanted to make a slight correction to the letter you posted yesterday about Xpics and the employees getting fired. I worked there for quite a while and left on good terms. I just wanted you to know that there are still some excellent employees left there, 4 to be exact, and if there are any internet headhunters out there looking for some quality people who can produce and produce quickly please feel free to email me at badunkle@hotmail.com. I will give you work history and references for all of them.

ActiveX: I am one of the people who were left over after the layoff's and to have Shlomo say in an open forum that I am a kiss ass just shows me how ignorant that person really is. For one i've only met Brian a hand full of times, and I certainly dont kiss anybodies ass. This whole thing that happened could have been seen from a long ways away and anyone that didnt see it, (much less tried to avoid it) had their eyes closed. There probably were alot of contributing factors as to what happened but I can sure say from personal experience that maybe if people thought that maybe their jobs were in jeopardy and sat out side and smoked a few less times or not come in 45 minutes late four days out of the week or didnt think their s--- didnt stink, possibly things would have been a little different. It was a sad thing that happened, and the rest of us are wondering if we're next...but I sure wouldnt sit and blame my problems on another person who's just trying to make ends meet or say they were a kiss ass.

Yankel: I am also one of the people still employed by Xpics, only people working for Infonent were let go. I feel bad for those who got let go, but the fact is, all the employees that work for Xpics at the time of the layoffs are still here and that's because we make money. A company can only survive for so long after funding numerous projects that create no income. The Xpics employees that are here, work hard and make the company money, and that's the bottom line. Xpics is hopefully going to be around for quite some time still, and if not, that's business.

Xwomen writes about James Fortune: Hey wormpuff, Don't get funy with us on how we spell. You think you are hot stuf, don't ya, having this site and all, don't ya? Get a little ego trip because you're name is on it (that goes for you 2 Mr. Ford)??.. We R going to have to start bruising the pretty boy pretty soon...maybe smack him with a few of R toys...in the next few days, we will make R demands known 2 Sharon Mitchell at AIM, since Fortune's little heart goes out 2 them so much...look 4 a little present N the mail next week, Big Boy.

Kianna Bradley Speaks Out

Metro contract girl Kianna Bradley writes: LUKE I MUST ALSO COMMENT TO MR COSTANO YOU NEED NOT SAY AWFUL HEARTLESS s--- LIKE YOU DID ABOUT JACK IT JUST MIGHT COME BACK ON YOU!!!!! WHY DONT YOU JUST KEEP YOUR IGNORANT COMMENTS TO YOURSELF? I JUST WENT THROUGH AN INCIDENT WERE I ALMOST LOST SOMEONE VERY DEAR TO ME ON DEC 21, AS MUCH AS I DIS LIKE HIM RIGHT NOW I WOULD NEVER EVER WANT HIM DEAD, AND TO HEAR PEOPLE SAY s--- LIKE THAT MAKES ME COMPLEATLY SICK!!!! I'M SURE HE HAS LOVED ONES TOO ..... JUST f---ING GROW UP!!!!

Emmett writes: Damn! Kianna Bradley has spoken! So know your role and shut your mouth! Hey, Luke who did Kianna Bradley almost lose on December 21? Family or fellow porn star?

Luke: Her ex-husband Earl Slate, supposedly almost died of a drug overdose.

Kianna writes: O.K. Emmett. I suppose that Luke will love this because he has not written anything about Earl and my Breakup out of respect for my feelings (thank you Luke) Here is the scoop, (I will probably get massacred by Earl after this) I have nothing bad really to say about Mr. Slate. The reason we are broken up is because he claims that he has a very bad drug problem because of me. Which humors me because we don't do the same drugs? Hehe lol :) (not that I do any drugs or support the use of drugs in any way) hehe haha lol :) I was extremely in love with Mr. Slate. (WAS being the operative WORD) He was so Self involved it was taking away from our relationship. I was so into this image of what he thought he was, it didn't allow me to be myself. After some very horrid emotional experiences through out our relationship, we found it best to part ways. I have found it impossible to be friends with Mr. Slate or to my best interest to be in the same zip code as him. He has a lot to learn about treating a woman. (especially one that cared about him) I have recovered this harsh break up and am happy I have many friends and love around me daily. I'd like to say, thank you very much to Luke for checking up on me, to Greg for cuddling me, to Mc Cormic for making me laugh (and putting up with my s---) Mike Adam for making me see the light and keeping me busy and working to keep my mind off of it and for being a awesome friend and my very bestest friend Phyllisha Anne.(see emmett, I have put all these people through hell) by the way Anabolic was there for me the entire time. If you really knew me you would understand what a basketcase i am right now and it takes a good person to deal with me. So, I hope that answers you question about the break up and it also may shed some light on why I am so f---ed up. I am just too nice for somebody to be mean to. (to Earl it didn't matter) Love Ya, Kianna

Emmett writes: Kianna Speaks writes with such passion. I wish she could be my professor for Literary Masterpiece! Thanks Kianna for info! I do pray that Earl Slate becomes congenial and mature as he gets older. As for ".(see emmett, I have put all these people through hell) " I am sure they know, just being close to you was worth it. As for Anabolic, I knew those guys were cool! Phyllisha without a doubt is awesome! You know, you and Phyllisha Anne should write a book together. You could call it "The Anne Bradley Life Chronicles; And Porn the way we know it" Just put your pictures on the front cover and you will sell about 10million copies alone!

Emmett writes: Dear Luke, Did you know that "fan" is derived from "fanatic"? Every now and then I think about it. A fan is an individual who has an obsession with another individual or object. Constantly subsitituting one's own social life with another. I do love watching porn as millions of others, but am I a fanatic? Jenna Jameson is just another sexy person who f--- and pose for a living. I and millions of others try to read anything we can about her in destroying her career and others. She is just a young woman who enjoys screwing for a living. Sure she mistakes but don't we all? I say we should we just keep our mouths shut about what goes on her personal life and comment on the actions the porn stars do in their films. Such as licking a guys ass! Anabolic, Diabolic, Extreme, and Euro films are good for that disgusting crap! So inconclusion... Rock on Jenna Jameson!!!! May you perform as long as you can!!

David writes: Just noticed those things across your face and felt a sense of irony. I hope its not prophetic irony. Have they always been there or are they new? Did you put 'em up or did Craig? I like you Luke, I hope I never have to read about your death at the hands of some low life porno thugs. That would be just too creepy after the appearance of those sights around your head. Watch yer back, man. get rid of those, will ya?

Pat Riley On Rough Sex

Pat Riley writes on RAME: Strictly speaking you are absolutely correct to state that my contention that "Rough Sex" and similar movies are a blight on civilization is my opinion however that's not the way the word is used in normal conversation, nor do I believe it was your intent to use the word in the strict dictionary-definition manner otherwise you wouldn't have even brought it up. It adds nothing to the debate as all such items including your views on kiddie porn are, strictly speaking, opinions. Instead you want to downgrade my view of "Rough Sex" to the red/blue car level of opinion, knowing full well that observers, particularly those who are attracted to this type of movie or have their own guilty deviancies, will be happy to seize on the "Just Riley's opinion" gambit to avoid further thought on the matter. As to whether the agreement of large numbers of people will raise the issue into the realm of the shape of the earth type fact, that depends on the issue. If the question is "Do the majority of the population find "Rough Sex" to be offensive?" the answer, depending on the level of proof offered, is probably yes. OTOH, if the question is more complex and in fact, like most social issues, breaks down into a series of questions:

"Does the majority have the right to impose its views of some level of moral standards on a minority against the minority's will?"

"What or whose moral standards?"

"Does a movie such as "Rough Sex" hinder or help the imposition of those moral standards?"

"Does it sufficiently hinder the imposition that it's worth the effort to eliminate it" then the agreement of large numbers of people may only be part of the proof of the truth of each subpart.

IOW there are reasonably objective proofs to some of the above regardless of the desires of the majority. One also has to contend with the fact that for all its faults we live in something close to a democracy where the majority does rule and in fact can rule dictatorially if they so desire. Tangentially, there's a question put in constitutional law which asks, "If a duly passed constitutional amendment were to deny to the Supreme Court the right to adjudicate the constitutionality of any law could the Supreme Court find the amendment unconstitutional?" A real toughie.

Back at the subject though, it seems clear that even based on nothing more than the red/blue type of choice the majority could decide whatever it wants and therefore would have some say just by virtue of being the majority. Apart from pure physical issues like the shape of the earth, there's another reason to consider the wishes of the majority as being correct and therefore proof: we are all a successful product of thousands of generations of natural selection and hence our collective decisions have generally been the right ones. If they weren't we wouldn't be here. Even in historical times we have examples--the Shakers come to mind--of groups who made the wrong decisions and therefore are no longer with us.

Of course you could argue that abrupt technological change invalidates the gut feel or naturally selected majority decision however it would seem logical that the burden of proof of such would encumber the person desiring change. You could also argue that the immediate desires of the majority are not, in fact, long term well-considered beliefs and are simply fads, and not worthy of acceptance. However to avoid a charge of arrogance and elitism you should be prepared to prove the faddish nature of the belief. (Just trying to be helpful, twofisted, and point out the mountain you have to climb .)

We use sex as a means of control and as a reward and without that control we'd have a very dismal existence indeed. The "we" is not the government (although that's us too, something the right constantly overlook) but individuals and organizations (primarily commercial) who enforce the control in tiny actions in our everyday lives. If you don't believe this, imagine castrating every male. Do you really think a young male would care about dating a girl, working hard to buy impressive things to attract the female, raising his social status, developing his social skills, or supporting a family (there wouldn't be any)? And would the females be working (both for money and in terms of effort) to attract a male. Not likely! We'd have a go-nowhere society with people just doing the minimum to survive. A disaster.

But the sex has to be of the right kind. Persuading that young male to lust after the attainable (at a cost) female down the block and to eventually pair bond with her is the right kind even if he's for a time masturbating to her mental image for relief. OTOH, encouraging him to think of females in terms of "beating up the broad" is hardly conducive to a long-lasting pair bond or perhaps any pair bond at all. Even if she's desperate enough to accept him the permission given by such movies as Rough Sex can only lead to the encouragement of that activity in real life. Note that the idea of Rough Sex is pure punishment; there is no reconciliation--loving behaviour--at the end.

I'll also address one other issue you raised earlier and that's gay movies. While the encouragement in gay movies might be contrary to reproductive success, they're not really offensive to moving society in the right direction. I'm presuming but I think I'm on reasonably firm ground that gays also have to achieve social status, develop social skills etc to attract other gays so in many respects their activities are no different than the heterosexual male and female.

Emmett: Pat Riley was a potent factor to why Rough Sex II was taken off the shelves. So why is he still talking about it? Move on Riley and talk about other porn films! Your s--- is getting weak! You won the war man! Move on!

Christ Have Mercy

From the Cincinnati Post:

http://www.cincypost.com/news/samesx021000.html

In a potentially movement-defining vote, Reform Jewish rabbis will decide next month whether to put a religious stamp of approval on same-sex unions between two Jews.

The issue has generated debate in the pages of Reform Judaism magazine, where a lesbian rabbi who recently married her female partner argued for Reform to recognize the marriage as kiddushin , a sacred union. A follow-up article rebutted, ''Not everything is Jewish ... not everything is holy.''

''This issue is deeply controversial,'' said Mark Washofsky, professor of rabbinics at Cincinnati's Hebrew Union College. ''To the extent that this union is seen as a marriage, then there is a problem. Jewish tradition understands marriage as heterosexual.''

Luke Gets Mail

Chris English writes: Please, please, please get rid of that flashing red banner . It is extremely annoying and distracting while attempting to read Luke. I don't think you are going to win any friends with it. Makes what used to be excellent and at entertainment bloody hard work. So much so that I often give up the goat half way through the column. I don't mean to be negative. Please take this in the spirit of constructive criticism because I'm sure you have given a lot of careful thought to the new layout and that you need to generate revenue, but please try to do it less obtrusively. Luke is the business and I for one don't need this distraction. It mars my enjoyment of his column... One final point don't you think that the eye finds it easier to read when the column is on the right hand side of the screen?

Cory: I have a few friends who are faithful readers of your column. Here's a friendly suggestion to pass on to you. "Put the text on the right hand side of your column like it used to be, instead of the left." It's alot easier and comfortable to read.

Brandy Alexandre: "Knowing how to put a page together code-wise, doesn't mean they know anything about form, format, aesthetics, and, in the case of Luke's site, how to make it compatible with both IE and Netscape. They really need a new webmaster. Because English is read from left to right, the brain automatically seeks a margin on the left side. This layout disrupts the reader's flow for two reasons, first because there is no left margin, second because there is so much space on the right side you don't anticipate the end of the line. Probably some kid trying to seem inventive or creative and just made a mess of it. As for the red banner, which has unfortunately been changed back to PsT in the continuing sellout of Luke F-rd, you could have right-clicked on it and selected "stop" when it flipped to white. Regardless of whose banner is where, I find the advertising throughout the column indicative of Luke's long slippery slide into the clutches of porn, where his last iota of credibility disappears as he becomes more and more dependent on the industry for money. I expect the content will slowly degrade to a state where nothing bad is said about anyone but the expendable women."

Chaim Amalek: "Luke - congratulations on silencing that damn winking banner. Now, in the spirit of Let's Her and You Fight to Entertain the Masses, let us consider a few of XX's negative comments regarding your web site: ". . . Because English is read from left to right, the brain automatically seeks a margin on the left side." Might this be a cryptic way of criticising me for paying homage to Hebrew, the holy tongue of my adoptive religion, which reads from right to left? I sure do hope not.

XX does have a point in criticising the increasing role that links to hard-core sex sites plays in the economics and credibility of my site. Clearly it appears that l-keford.com is selling out. Why have I not started that 900 phone service? Let me review that plan's numbers. I charge folks $4.00/minute to get a sneak peek at what is about to appear on the web site, taking care not to give so much advance warning that lawyers or internet assassins could reasonably be employed to silence me. If only 20 compulsive porners were to call my number each day for 5 minutes per call (I will talk very slowly), that would provide me with revenues of 20x4x5 = $400/day, or over $140,000 per year! All I need do is figure out what it costs to set up a 900 telephone service. (And I could start out by covering only the LA area, if that were more economical, to tap into the pockets I most want to reach.)

"The important question here is me, Luke F-rd. Why haven't I done this? Probably because I need to be pushed to it. [My old friend Chaim is working on that angle as well - he promises to hook me up with EXACTLY the woman I need in my life. I wonder who she will be?] But wait! XX could be my business partner and secretary, the dominant force who makes it all come together for me. After all, Lord knows I need someone to edit and FACT CHECK the crap I get before I post it. What a great idea! Perhaps we could work out of my home office! We could both use the extra cash. And she will see what it is like to work for a Jew who puts Torah before materialism. Maybe then she will stop criticising me for the way I arrange the margins on my web site. How about it - will you come work for me, and help motivate me to become the success that I know I could yet be? -Luke F-rd"

Brandy: Luke, your putting in two X's in place of my initials don't fool anyone, especially when the comments come right after comments of my own. All I can say to Chaim is "get over yourself." He's almost sounding like some feminazi who thinks that any form of sex is rape and sees subversive anti-female slants in all media. Yours is an English site, and English is read left to right. If it was read right to left, the brain would seek a margin at the right. It's all about the brain and reading, not about his f---ing Hebrew. He should knock that chick off his shoulder or have chat with his Rabbi about why he feels guilty about his holy tongue to the extent that he EXPECTS everyone to target him.

Hymie Finkelstein writes: Hello handsome. Just a few things Luke. (not for publishing of course) 1. Kendre Jade is cute but kissing her would be like kissing some divine ashtray. 2. Trisha is none other than Ashley Shye. Just a new name. She's been around the block. She's done the whole circuit. So now she changes her name and can complete the cycle again? 3. Forgive my ignorance but you once stated that you make around 50 g's a year. Now I'm assuming that at least 90% of that is from your website. Please correct me if Im wrong. Im not trying to be nosey and feel free to tell me it's none of my business. But do you get paid just based on the number of "hits" your site gets? Or is it how many hits that link to other sites and generate membership? I know there are mucho adult websites with expensive monthly memberships. I can certainly understand the source of income there. But with sites that contain just links to other sites ...well...... is the money in advertising that good? Please enlighten me Oh Son of David.

Luke: Hi big boy. My money comes from a contract with XXXgen.com which owns all advertising space on the site.

BTW, Gene Ross or Paul Fishbein or anyone, I need a list of all the places I've lived in the last five years for my lawsuits. Damn, these lawyers are putting me through the ringer.