Season 4, Episode 12 (Neil)

Eric: 0:02

Hello and welcome to the Q lounge, I'm Eric

Gil: 0:06

and I'm Gil.

Eric: 0:06

join us as we discuss news stories and life situations, as they relate to the LGBTQIA plus experience, please visit us at theQloungepodcast.com and hit that subscribe button or listen wherever you get your podcasts. If you would like to follow us on social media, you can hit us up on Facebook @theQloungepodcast or on Instagram or Twitter @theQlounge. Hello and welcome to the Q lounge. I'm Eric

Gil: 0:34

and I'm Gil.

Eric: 0:35

And today we are joined by Neil. Hello, Neil, how are you? Good.

Neil: 0:40

How are you

Eric: 0:41

guys doing well? Thanks. Welcome back. I think you are our first guest who actually come back and be like a guest again. Excluding our tea times, but I think you're like the first one to, yes, come back. So thank you. Welcome back.

Neil: 0:58

So super happy to be on the show I love you guys. and It's awesome. Being a part of your group and of the Q lounge and hopefully, the the newest sponsor for your business that you guys provide. So thank you for having me.

Eric: 1:12

You're welcome. Thank you. Thank you so much. We love having you and feelings mutual. So when you were on our show last time, You were on season one and you were under your stage name or pseudonym Adam strips, right? Yep. Yep. Tell us a little bit about what's been happening since that time to now. And what's the importance of having that pseudonym as an adult entertainer? Just so our audience kind of knows, I figure it's for privacy to keep work life work. And so you don't get stalkers, like going after you with your real names, but that's just what I think.

Neil: 1:48

No worries. So yeah, I went by Adams strips for about 10 years. Wow. And I was a stripper at Boystown Denver and also at PTs. And I loved it. I loved the adult industry, the nightlife, everything that I was part of. And I was super happy to be a part of that. And eventually there's always a point to moving on to bigger and better things hopefully. And in the interim I had been thinking over heavily drunken nights.

Gil: 2:17

All been there

Neil: 2:18

about, any of the dating services, Tinder, grinder anything like that, there's a lot of fake profiles and bots and, sometimes you just wanna have a nude picture for your profile picture and and none of them allow that for some reason. Sure. Mainly because they want to be in the app store, so they cut out all of the adult content. And so in being tired of all of the bots that would hit me up late night, drunken, I get my hopes up and it ends up just being some sort of spam. I decided to create what was when our first episode aired, I believe I was still calling it social swing thing. Yes. Yes but I, it wasn't really about the name. It was about building the platform at that point. And in building the platform, I realized this is much more than just a, nightlife, dating, swingers kind of thing. I wanted it to be a fully blown social media network. And not just for nudity, they have a whole bunch of porn websites for, sharing. X-rated content, this would at least give everybody the ability to have their own freedom of speech, freedom of expression and a safe place where you're not, gonna show your adult content related posts or your views and opinions, to your mother, brother, sister cousins, kids all of your family. Yeah, so it's definitely a little more private. We're not in the app store, just only fans is not in the app store. Yeah. And I think in some parts it's probably better that way. I know that we would get a lot of traffic if we were, but and I still don't know why they will allow Twitter which has a ton of adult content. And I know Eric, you were saying, you were saying that you used Twitter for all your porn. Hey don't knock Twitter. It wasn't that I was, it wasn't that I was knocking them. It was it just might, comprehension of wait, they have 50%, at least according to Elon Musk like 50% or more spam profiles and bots on their platform. And then a ton of adult content, videos pictures, stuff like that, but yet they are still allowed in the app store. So what's different between Twitter. and the adult social media being that our name has the word adult in it. Oh my God. But it's a name, the horror. Yeah. Yeah, that's what I've been up to just programming away and trying to hire on and get as many people that wanna join the community and help the community grow different developers around the world. Getting them on board so we can build the best platform possible for all.

Eric: 5:03

That's awesome. Thank you for that. I wanted to just comment on one thing you said, like early on the fact that you got hit up by bots and fake profiles on dating apps is crazy to me, but it also makes me feel a little bit better, cuz that's all I ever get and all that ever contacts me. So

Neil: 5:23

And we did a deeper dive into the algorithm of Tinder and different dating sites and they really do have the algorithm based off of your age, in your profile. So if you're over a certain age, then you'll actually get less replies. And there are a lot of people, in the adult content creation industry where they use these dating profiles to get clients and that's not. Don't get me wrong. I love the ability to have access to a dating profile online. Cuz you wanna meet someone, you wanna meet someone, you sign up to these accounts to meet someone, not to buy someone's content. And I love the adult content creator industry as well. They need to have a place to be able to promote themselves. But I don't think that on dating sites is necessarily the best way to disappoint the users of the platform by spanning their content out to them.

Eric: 6:23

Yeah, no, I IAnd. That makes total sense. Adult social media, that's the name of the platform, it's pretty great. We're a part of it. We have a group on there, so yes, Thank you. I'm becoming more active on there. Definitely

Neil: 6:38

Join the Q lounge on ASM. Yes, adult social media.

Eric: 6:41

We, and we will definitely put that into the liner notes or the show notes. As well as the, so tell us a little bit about adult social media or ASM.

Neil: 6:52

Like I was saying, the the dating community, wants to have a little bit more freedom with the profile picture that they post and and they also wanna see, more sexy content from other users. We give that ability for sure. In part of the platform we integrate a swipe dating service. Okay, cool. It's okay. It's admittedly very rudimentary at this point. There isn't a, an algorithm per se. It's, if you are straight male, then you see straight females. If you're gay, then you see gay and BI profiles. If you're BI, then you see gay men and straight women profiles. If you're lesbian, you only see other lesbians. So that's the basis of the way that works. I'm sure in the future, there will be more algorithmic changes to improve people's, ability to see, who they wanna see. But we also balance that with not. Not taking or storing any personal data from users, including their geolocation. As of right now. Oh, awesome. because we want it to stay at private social media. So it's a balancing act for sure. Yeah.

Eric: 8:08

Sounds like you have your hands busy.

Neil: 8:12

That's one part I guess the other couple parts is we wanted to build a a USA based platform, like only fans. We love only fans. We love the content creators on it and everything But when you get stuck with a cable company and you're like, man, I can only go with this cable company or I can only go with this electric company. Because that's the O the number one and I'm pissed at them. And I want to go somewhere else. There's really not another large format. Content creator network out there. So we integrate the swipe dating services with and only fans based selling platform for models so they can create their own model store and and they can sell their content. And then along with that, we also add I wanna say it's like a Facebook platform. But it has a Twitter feel to it. And Facebook by far is In depth, with their coding, they've been around a long time. they're creating the metaverse and all this stuff, which, I have my own opinions on that but it's it's basically like Facebook, you have your chat feed. So you can see other people's posts. You can comment, you can like you'll be able to share that post on your feed. So it'll go in your profile. And then likewise, back up into the newsfeed area you can create groups private, public there's also an events area where, if you're a business you can create in person events and you can also charge ticket pricing. Now some of this might actually change in the future because of the 3.0 update that we've been working on for the past, it feels. Eight eight months to almost a year oh, wow. But I do plan to reintegrate some of those functionalities back into the 3.0 platform, but there's different reasons on why we're rebuilding the whole infrastructure of ASM current.

Eric: 10:13

Okay. Awesome. Sounds like a lot going on. And a lot of, it's probably over my head too, cuz I don't understand all that text line

Neil: 10:23

but it's a lot of nerd talk. So I apologize for you here. That's rolling their eyes at the moment. No,

Eric: 10:29

we appreciate it. And we have, I'm sure some listeners who appreciate it. So so what makes you stand out from other sites? The only fans and

Neil: 10:43

Only fans doesn't have a dating area and then I I don't believe they have the functionality for like actual social networking so we definitely integrate those two other services into the platform. So it's not just a model store. It'll actually in the future, hopefully soon have an area where models can do like a sexy story. And just like in Facebook you can create a story or even Instagram, you can create a story and it goes up at the top and you swipe and you go through people's, stories. This will be more exclusive to VIP members to models and to businesses where they can put up any of their products, their services they can, be nude, shaken, shaking it around, or, doing whatever And as long as they're they haven't approved account then they'll be able to post there for all of the other users on the platform.

Eric: 11:37

Oh, that's cool. Cause I know there's certain social media platforms out there now who are very, I guess they're tar speaking from a queer perspective, they're targeting the queer content creators and we've had a couple guests on our show who are queer content creators who, when they post things are constantly getting flagged or constantly having their profiles deleted or put on hold and put on pause. Yeah. And I know one of them specifically is now on his third or fourth page because they keep flagging him. And honestly, most of the stuff he posts are just model shoots and very artistic and contain no nudity at all, might be in his underwear or something, but that's about it. And he's constantly getting flagged and. It's cool that you're offering a platform so that people can actually put their art out there, put their content out there without the worries of, oh my gosh, is this gonna get flagged? Oh, I can't put that one out there. Cuz that might be considered too risque or whatever else

Neil: 12:49

Yeah. And I had the same or a similar issue as well. And that's something that, I don't quite understand is the things that get flagged on Instagram or Facebook you'll have, let's say a really beautiful looking, female in a fishnet shirt, and as long as there's a fishnet shirt in front of the nipples, you're fine. But you can obviously see, The nipples like everything. And I don't mind it being on there at all, but then when me, 10 years ago I took I took a picture of a bandana hanging over the front of my male parts And did they make

Eric: 13:32

bandana as big enough for that?

Neil: 13:34

I had to,

Eric: 13:36

sorry, it was a t-shirt that was wrong with me. I apologize.

Neil: 13:39

T-shirt but I thought it was, actually a pretty sexy male post that didn't show anything at all. but that got flagged over and over that was something else that kind of bugged me for a while was like, why am I getting targeted for this? And you can, as long as you're female and you're posting, you can put up, almost. Full nude photos. As long as there's nothing weird. But yeah as a male or in the L G B T community you get slammed constantly and I'm glad that we can provide something a little better for the community as well.

Eric: 14:13

That's very nice.

Neil: 14:14

You're we're really all about make love, not war. Put out, your sexy content, show yourself off. But if you're gonna use the platform to start inciting riots or, just dead name, people, or, try to docs different accounts, different things like that. We're not about all the drama, there's drama of course, in any social network, but as long as there's no hate speech going on then, we're fine with freedom of speech. We just want people to. Be considerate of others and and what's going on.

Eric: 14:45

That's awesome.

Gil: 14:46

That's you guys have ways of monitoring

Neil: 14:49

that? Correct? We do. Okay. And generally there's like an algorithm. That that Facebook uses to where they use like a facial recognition software that actually monitors things for blood or, different things. And then it goes to a review panel. If somebody debates it and says, no, I might this content's fine. Then it goes to review panel. And then, if if it's still up for debate, it goes to some higher up to make the final decision and call But for now, what we have is a reporting system where if three to five users report a post then it gets sent in for review. And then I have a couple of web developers that took over the review process. And if there's any question, then it would come to me as a higher up to say, do we wanna allow or not allow this content? And then also afterwards how we would deal with that person's profile I'm sure. In the future. And we do have a kind of a, let's say Facebook jail system where you're not allowed to post or comment and we can set a certain amount of days or we can completely remove the person's profile as. But I think on a paid social network that, it costs a dollar for a verified account per month. we're verifying that the person is of age by having the ability to make that payment every month. But also it creates value in their account by having that paid okay. Platform so that they don't really wanna screw around too much and lose something that, that they've been paying for months and months or yeah. Whatnot.

Gil: 16:27

Okay. So that's good. I always get nervous now cuz of, things are a little bit different it doesn't matter that

Eric: 16:35

I live my life in Facebook jail. It's like a running joke with a lot of my friends that I'm always in Facebook jail. I've actually been flagged for content too, because I was like, I took a picture of myself in gray sweatpants. And I got flagged and I was like, okay,

Neil: 16:51

that was a dirty one. I saw that.

Gil: 16:56

No.

Eric: 16:58

I was like, did you really

Neil: 17:02

have it as my screensaver? Okay.

Eric: 17:05

It's very looking. So here we go.

Neil: 17:11

No I understand why they do it because Facebook is a family oriented social media platform. And it is what it is. Even though mark Zuckerberg started. Facebook by creating a yeah. This girl or hot, or not basically was the, the makeup of it using college dorms to, to rate women on their looks. But anyway it's turned into a family social network and that's again why we're happy to have our own adult social network for users who are interested. Yeah.

Eric: 17:43

Awesome. So being that you're a former sex worker yourself how has that helped you with connecting to other content creators and content creators in general, who choose to come to the platform or are shopping around looking for new platforms and avenues?

Neil: 17:59

It quite honestly has not helped me at all. oh, really? Okay. Yeah. I. I had three different Facebook profiles not pages but profiles. One is my personal, the other was Adam strips. And then and then the third is called adult media with two T's and two A's. And when I tried promoting anything on Adam's trips it seemed my followers came from the club that's where they were, interested and wanted to see me. And the only thing that I would get is, Hey showed us your Dick, show us your Dick. And I'm like, guys I'm not sending you my Dick picture. Sorry. But I built this and it took me, thousands and thousands of dollars and years of my life, would you like to join for free? And they're like, maybe, and. If it wasn't my personal nude content that was on there they weren't really receptive. So I, from a business standpoint, created a third profile for the adult social media and started just networking with models and content creators. And I think half of them probably think that I'm a bot or some kind of spam profile and we try not to spam out. We don't, over post or content post on anyone's page or network. And actually we do a lot more sharing of models. Content on our either our feed or our story just to help spread awareness about certain models, content, creators for free and especially the ones that, that join and sign up on our platform. We'll. All day long. But yeah, it really hasn't helped me in the slightest. I think when people actually find out that I'm a real person and that I used to be a stripper that's when they're like, oh, holy shit. And I actually get through to that one person. For the masses to really understand that we're real and that I was 10 years in the adult industry. It doesn't it doesn't come through very easily.

Eric: 20:01

Wow, that's surprising to me, but I guess in some ways it's not, cuz I just know how since we've talked to a lot of adult entertainers and people in the sex work industry on this show, then I have just personally as well, I guess there's always like that wall up because you never know, if those people are just like trying to get close to you because of the fantasy that they have of you or they're trying to like, I guess live out, I guess it is a fantasy regardless. They're trying to live out some weird fantasy that they have that they're in involving you in when you're like, I don't even wanna be in that. So I understand like where there's that apprehension, but I think it's sad because I guess ignorantly, I would think that being that you were in the industry for so long that it would, have that bridge there, but I guess they're coming at it from their own perspective as well. But I think at least once they find out that you are, it gives, there is a little bit of that camaraderie or that ability to what's the word I'm looking for kind

Neil: 21:03

of sympathize or mesh with their person. Yeah. Cause

Eric: 21:09

you understand where they're coming from. You are you're you understand what they've dealt with or what they're dealing with, because I'm sure you have stories. I know you told us some stories the last time you were here, so yeah. You know in some ways like what they're going through and some regards.

Neil: 21:25

Yeah. Yeah. Similar stories and experiences for sure. I think when you're in the adult industry, you have a goal in mind and the end goal is to make money. So if you're talking to someone who's not paying you, then you're not making money and. Just like being in a strip club. If the customer's not paying you, you generally circle on and move on. Yeah. I think it'll take a little bit of time for people to realize oh, this is this is a platform that is being provided that, I can advertise myself on, I can sell my own content on and I can be who I want to be and create my own social group and invite people who are on the platform who are obviously into adult content. And it's an all in one inclusive platform where you know, that the people that you're talking to are into the. Industry in, in, instead of, like on Facebook, you're promoting out to a family network social network where you don't know if this guy Joe blow wants to buy your content or not, he's got four kids and he's he likes your posts, then you're gonna spam 'em and say, Hey, buy my content on this platform, you might as well just be doing that on the same platform. And just saying, Hey, you're on this social network. And you like adult content and I provide it. So here's my link and title, my model store.

Eric: 22:50

Yeah. It it funnels them in, like you said it's a platform for adult content, adult social media. So it's right there. So why not? You're not trying, you're not trying to fish for someone who might be interested cuz they're obviously interested being on the platform, so

Neil: 23:05

correct. And they. Oh, sorry, go.

Gil: 23:09

Oh, no, I'm just saying it's at least you're not gonna, no, nobody should be shocked on the website itself, because I remember when like only fans had that issue of oh my God, there's a lot of adult content on here. Yes. This happens on here. yeah

Neil: 23:21

And you guys remember when it was a year or two ago where only fans was planning on actually getting rid of all of their adult content. Yeah. Yeah. And the funny part was like, they were built by the models that were on the platform and then the the owners of only fans. We're just gonna turn around and forsake them and say, Nope, sorry. You helped us create this and now we're gonna out you. So we can have famous people on here and they can have their own, way to make more money. And I was like, what in the hell? Like that it is so wrong. I hope I hope people understand in creating a platform like this, we are genuinely all about, the content creators. And we're backing them a hundred percent and we're here to stay. We're not going to one day turn around and say, oh, no, I think we want will Smith on here, on the adult social media to to. It's it's not going to change it's we're here to stay.

Eric: 24:23

That's really good. Cuz I know there was that huge issue also. And I think we talked about it on the last time you were here when like Bella thorn specifically started an only fans thing and she made their server crash and then all these people wanted their money back. And then so they like changed the rates of what they were paying the models. And as you said, like just a couple years ago, they're like, oh, we're doing away with adult content creators. I didn't know. I didn't realize it was due to cuz they wanted celebrities on there. But I know, I knew a lot of adult content creators that I'm friends with or who that I chat with. We're like, what the hell do we do now? And that's totally fucked up that we, like you just said, literally built your platform. And now you're saying piece out yeah.

Neil: 25:07

And also Bella thorn if she's listening ever she can join, she can charge whatever she wants and we only take 20% instead of 30, like only fan desk. Oh, awesome. Oh, good to know. And feel free to crash our servers. We actually own our own servers now. Instead of like going through host gator or go daddy or something like that, like we, we own our own servers and hopefully in the future can have a server farm. So if you crash the network that's only a, that's a test to how good our servers are. And if it crashes, we'll just buy more. Okay,

Gil: 25:47

that's awesome. so what do you think of the importance of reaching out to, especially like the L G B T Q creators and stuff like that?

Neil: 25:58

I think it's really important. I think everyone should be able to have a voice. And we're willing to work with anyone that is a respectful person that, that doesn't want to get, their voice silenced. And I think that unfortunately happens more often with the adult content creators that are in the L G B T community. So giving them a space where, you know for whatever algorithm that we create eventually in this new 3.0 update it will. Show the L G B T content creator communities, content over to people that are interested in actually seeing and purchasing that content. So it'll make it easier for them to get on and sell their content to the right audience. Oh, good.

Eric: 26:47

Oh, awesome. And have you done any like outreach or promotions to the community?

Neil: 26:52

So we do and we actually just recently hired a outsourcing team for our social media content creation and advertising and we try to reach out but me, myself, when I'm in development mode and I'm not. A hundred percent happy with something I have a hard time with promoting something that isn't perfect to me. Okay. Like I said, for the last nine months or so give or take a few months we've been developing this 3.0 platform. That's a custom built custom coded platform. And for hacking purposes and stuff like that security, but and also site speed, but if it's not available and ready, then I don't wanna push too much and promote something that isn't ready yet. I, I would rather have that be completed and then just blow everything out of the water and, have our new social media team just go all out. And yeah, when that time comes, we'll definitely be advertising out to the LGBT community more often, for sure.

Eric: 28:09

And we'll be very happy to yes. Help advertise for you as much as we possibly

Neil: 28:13

can. I'll be very happy to have you guys sponsoring you guys because I love the show. I've known you, Eric for, oh, I don't know what, 20 15, 20 years.

Eric: 28:27

possibly, probably like 15. I think I met you when you first started. I think I might have met you like on your first night on the strip club.

Neil: 28:36

yeah, I was goofy guiding glasses.

Eric: 28:39

yeah. And you were like super nice and super chill. Yeah. And we were like, oh, we like him. And then you were like, of course, awesome on the pole. So that was always a huge plus for me. I think we talked about this the last time you were here too. I even saw you when you were in Phoenix

Neil: 28:55

oh, shit. Yeah, you did.

Eric: 28:59

But that's just, I have, I honestly was not stalking you. I just happened to be there. Cause I was performing in a show myself.

Neil: 29:08

He was stalking me like what?

Gil: 29:10

Blink twice. damnit.

Eric: 29:16

They found me out.

Gil: 29:17

How was how, oh, sorry. How have you guys been growing as a network or I guess starting to become more

Neil: 29:24

competitive. So we're not really. Competing so much right now. I think when we're done there, won't be a real need to compete because we'll be the only platform like ourselves that integrate. Okay. Dating social media and content creator sales in all, on all in one platform. I could be wrong. I don't frequent other platforms. I know that there's. Just for fans, Lee fans, all of the, all the variances. Yeah. But, we're trying to be more air conditioned based and not so much fan related.

Eric: 30:04

I love that.

Neil: 30:04

So so the computing won't really be too much of a hassle. I think once people see it use it, it's easy to navigate simple yet very functional and has a lot of Different things that you can do on it. Then I think it'll really be a very popular platform in the long run. But right now network infrastructure site speed having our own servers keeping the costs down it's I would have to say it's been over $10,000 that we've invested maybe over 15,000 so far. And then on top of that, I'm a web developer as well. So I've saved I would say hundreds of thousands of dollars by doing a lot of the web development myself, because developers are not cheap by any means. No.

Gil: 31:00

Yeah.

Neil: 31:03

But yeah. As, as long as, we continue the course and and we get a couple of these last minute updates done. Then we'll be able to roll out like the official beta version which will be much faster more easy, simple to navigate upgrade, downgrade your membership at any time. And in this upgrade that we created, we actually had to build our own payment processor. Okay. Be because credit card companies, they don't like to work with adult content platforms, websites, anything So we actually had to custom build and custom code our own payment processor. So we can Except or receive credit cards and debit cards instead of going through something like PayPal, which can get you shut down pretty quick. I know was it cash app or not cash app? Yeah. Venmo cash app PayPal. All Stripe for instance I've tried three times setting up an account with Stripe just to be able to take credit cards and it gets shut down very fast. And same with PayPal very quick to be shut down. We went the legal route and went to the credit card processing companies and we said, Hey, look, we want a legitimate account. Here's our EIN for our business. We're all above board. We have a business bank account for all of this. We do all of our taxes and even still, it was like $280 a month just in fees. Which sucked all of the, the initial revenue from the company, when you're not making much 200 a month or two 80 a month is a lot.

Eric: 32:44

Oh yeah, for sure. We can relate to that.

Gil: 32:48

We know

Eric: 32:54

What kind of benefits do you offer for content creators? Cause I know you said earlier that you guys only take 20%, whereas like only fans and all those fan sites typically take 30% are around there.

Neil: 33:04

And so I think the reason that they take 30% is because of their payment processing fee and by us custom coding and creating our own payment processor, we can keep that cost down and offer just a 20% take. And the reason why networks take 20% is because of the cost of running a social network like that. it's insanely expensive and you have to have, your maintenance crew your developers keep the side up and running. You have to promote the side out to users. So then you have a bigger user base come in. So models actually have people to sell too. And you have to keep things growing. Build new functionalities and stuff like that. So there's a reason to take 20%. But one thing in the future that we really want to do is offer at least one free paid vacation to models that are in the 10% or above category. Oh, awesome. So if you're on there, you're using it, you're promoting it, you're selling on it. Then, you'll be, like only fans has, oh, you're in the top 10 or you're the top 1% of content graders. If they're in the top 10 or top 5%, we would love to be able to say, Hey, look, you've been with us for a year now you're in the top 5%. And here's your visa, MasterCard, gift card. You can either use this for a free paid vacation or, keep it as a bonus. Basically, oh, that's really

Eric: 34:36

awesome. So cool.

Neil: 34:38

That's nice. And I think that there would be a stipulation or addition to that as if they used it on a vacation and they took some of our merchandise, hat tank top, underwear, whatever and they were posting content about their free paid vacation. Then we would give an additional, like a hundred dollars, $200 bonus to that model. Just for the extra, promot.

Eric: 35:08

Nice. What kind of underwear do you sell? I have a little fetish for underwear, so

Neil: 35:13

I know you do you bought me a bunch of pairs of underwear. So we don't have underwear necessarily right now. In the beginning, I think the last time I was on with you guys we had a a storefront where, it was like a drop shipping kind of thing where it was branded merchandise, hats, shirts, stuff like that. But we were so new that, like I was trying to get my head straight in what was my priority? Should I be making money by any means necessary or should I just be biting the bullet and creating something that is the best functional platform possible? And I spent. Many nights up on the computer until six, seven in the morning coding and developing and adding a whole bunch of stuff. And the store ended up not really getting any sales or at least not very many to make anything profitable. We backtracked on that. And we said, okay, we're gonna put this to the wayside. And we're going to really just try and create a really good social network. But that store will be coming back out after we get some of these things done and then hopefully we can give an additional discount to models for any of our merchandise. Let's say there's always an upcharge for drop shipping. services you the hat initially cost $5 or $10, but you sell it for 30. For models. We would sell the hat for let's say $8 instead of 30 Because we know that they're gonna use it, for their content creation or for, their modeling photography and that they're more vested in the network. Okay.

Eric: 36:55

So you've recently been to like adult entertainment, conventions and stuff. Was that for ASM? How did all that

Neil: 37:01

go? We did go to Las Vegas for, and I thought it was interesting, but for an adult convention I was there actually on business for a couple of other reasons as well, but noticed that there was the convention going on, so decided to check it out. It was a private convention though because the AVN awards it's adult video network they, I found out a couple years ago they had an event completely shut down because of some drama that was going on. And so they had to go underground for the last few years. And I think that they're actually gonna start doing public events again. Oh, nice. But I'm not sure if that was a with COVID going on and with drama and everything, they probably figured, there's too much touching here and too much spreading of stuff. So let's just keep it on the down low for a little bit. Okay. But I was happy to go I think it was beneficial. We definitely got around 500 cards, passed out and got talked to some models. Nice. Very good. And I'd really like to do that again in the future, but admittedly, I was stoked, about being there and being happy, but came back and over the next couple weeks or so I was like, okay, we're gonna get, a bunch of signups. And I think we only got roughly 50. To a hundred, out of those five or 600 cards that we passed out and talked to different people. Not bad, but not as good as it could have been for

Eric: 38:31

sure. True. I think it's always, that seems to happen a lot. I know. We just did a big what's it called? Advertising spree, I guess probably like last year, because we were on hiatus for a while, but I think we didn't get a whole lot. We shelled out however much money. It cost like however many hundreds of dollars. It was for advertising. And I think we got just like a few back, but it was still more people than we had. So it was more people that were exposed to the podcast and hopefully they tell their friends and they tell their friends and yeah, because a lot of it's word of mouth. So hopefully that happens. What's been the feedback for ASM from the,

Neil: 39:14

Model. So there's always good and bad feedback, I would say. I'll start with the negative feedback first, some of it was, oh, the site, is pretty confusing to use. Some people said, that the load speeds were pretty slow. They didn't know how to add products to their model store. And we also had an issue with cross platform video content. So if you're uploading a video from iPhone you aren't able to see it on an Android and vice versa. So we had to in, in this new development, that was one of our bigger hurdles was, how do we get over this? And we actually had to create a, an automated program where when a user uploads, any video, it gets converted into a specific format that works both with iOS and Android. So everyone can see the video content that's being posted. But that was mainly the negative side of things. The positive for sure is, everything that's been stated, it's an awesome place to be yourself to post to meet new people. They like the basic ability for the swipe dating services and that it's not an algorithm. And they also like that we don't have any bots or fake accounts on the network as well. That's something that definitely Twitter can't say for themselves but and that $1 a month really does cut down on any type of fake spam, profile, stuff like that. Yeah. Which is another benefit just to having a verified account. But yeah, that's that's the long and short of it.

Eric: 41:09

What are the different accounts that you offer?

Neil: 41:12

So there's a free account and you can choose gay, straight bi or lesbian. And then you have a V I P or no, sorry, a verified account for a dollar. And that still goes gay, straight BI lesbian. If you upgrade to a VIP account, which is $5 a month, then you have access to see all of the content on the platform. So not just advice, versa, content, you have access to everything and everyone, every group. And then after that you have your model account model accounts don't have access to the swipe dating area. But they have access to create a model store. So there's a trade off with that. And we created that to keep the. Models who are selling content out of the swipe dating area, because if you're looking for a companion or companionship you don't wanna run into a bunch of people just trying to sell their content. And then after that we have business accounts for $20 a month. And that gives you the ability to get access to an advertising area that you can have like a single ad put up in a general like scrolling ad service when you create your account. But then you can also go in and you can. Pay additionally for other areas in the platform. And I'm speaking about 3.0, basically I know you haven't seen this yet, but the advertising is a huge thing. So when a model uploads content, let's say to the sexy stories area just like YouTube. If the story is more than 15, 20, 30 seconds a minute, whatever, either halfway through or before the content loads, you'll have a five, five second to eight, second window where a business can say, I want to have my ad put in the sexy stories area. So then they pay for the advertising. They create their content and then it gets uploaded after verification before a model's sexy story starts, and this would be rotated through every 10 stories that someone swipes through. Then there's, an advertisement of a, an adult business. And then also, there's three different areas. Basically. There's an infe ad where when you're scrolling, down through the newsfeed, there will be an ad that you can place there. There's an in the sexy story area before any video. And then there's also a rotating banner ad at the top of the feed. Which is a, our third placement that we're working on as well. But we're also building out our analytics. So each business will have access to their own analytics of how their ads are doing on the network. How many clicks they've gotten into their website. And this also goes for the affiliate accounts. Anyone can have an affiliate account and there's an affiliate dashboard where you can see how many clicks you've gotten on your affiliate link and how much money you've made. And then you can cash out after a certain amount of money. And yeah. I think actually the model store also has a an analytics area where you can, see the number of sales and different data, stuff like that.

Eric: 44:55

Awesome. So you're just really helpful. That's helping people promote their brands and make money for themselves and everything else. I think's really awesome of you.

Neil: 45:07

Yeah. If you're even if you're a cabaret strip club if you own an adult toy shop or lingerie shop and you can't advertise the way you want to or you think that, this crotchless underwear would be awesome. On this model to, to sell that underwear, you can't put that picture anywhere on any social network because you'll get flagged. So oh yeah. If the model can promote himself while the company promotes themself and their product on the model on our network, then there you go. That's a

Eric: 45:44

win-win. Yeah. Yep.

Gil: 45:48

we can't wait for the 3.0. To launch looks good. Yeah,

Neil: 45:51

man. I've I've been waiting and I I get word from the developers that it's oh yeah. We're gonna be ready to launch here, on, on Monday or on Friday. So I go on, social media and I'm like, yeah, we're gonna, we're gonna launch, or we're gonna do it this date this time. And. Inevitably something pops up and it's shit, we can't because of this or we wanna make sure that this is good or, whatever. And when you're custom building and custom coding, all of this stuff, it's it's not like a website page builder where you can just say, oh, I wanna do this here and not there. And, and this is all built for speed for, privacy not able to hack as easily. Yeah. And and we don't want, our network to go down because of, just different things. Correct. So it's it's definitely a an undertaking to say the least, but I think we have three or four. Developers in different countries now. Oh, dang. And then me I try to keep up with them, but they're really good. I try to take their word with a grain of salt though, because they get excited about it too. And then something comes up. I'm going to make sure, that I test everything myself before I go out and I say, okay, let's create a launch date. And then we build up, the anticipation and then we launch something that is already working. It's already there. We just flip the switch and turn it on. Oh, wow.

Eric: 47:20

Sounds like quite the labor of love and. Hopefully. Yeah, definitely. It's just, it's huge

Gil: 47:25

accomplishment. Cause you're likes, you've been talking about it. It's built it's in motion. You're perfecting it, you wanna make sure it's, smooth yeah. As best you can.

Neil: 47:35

And the 2.0 area, don't get me wrong. It's good. Everything works. It's fun, functional right now, but we want it to when a user first signs up and it's their first time on there and they get on and they're like, wow. Like we want that wow factor instead of it just being like, oh, okay. This is

Eric: 47:54

cool. I think all platforms probably have some growing pains, like when they first launched, compared to like where they are now. So

Neil: 48:02

yeah. I know Twitter started because they were measuring I think it was earthquakes or. Earthquakes or tornadoes? I can't remember. But it was, oh, it was an early warning system for earthquakes. So people could let others know that they felt something happen. It was, at this scale or level and then anyone within that area could get a notification that there was something happening. So yeah, they grew from that basic standpoint out to the social network they are today. So you always have to start somewhere for sure.

Eric: 48:35

Absolutely. Looks like you're starting to grow and what can we do to help you grow? And I know. We're gonna be kind. You would,

Neil: 48:44

You would ask that wouldn't you

Eric: 48:48

I totally didn't even mean it that way.

Gil: 48:54

The tone Eric. I was like, I would totally do

Eric: 48:56

that too, but you guys see his gesture, but so did not mean it that way. Oh my God. you guys just know me too?

Neil: 49:04

No. Just joining, signing up spreading the word. I think what really makes it a social network, you can sign up yourself, you can see what it is. but it's not social unless you have your friends or, a group of people. If you're gonna join, make sure to tell your friends to join too. Shit, they can join for free. They can still see it. They can like it they can I don't think that they can comment or that they can post until they upgrade for a dollar, but they can still be a part of the network. They can purchase model content as a free account. But yeah, spreading the word realizing that this is an adult content network, that it was built by someone who was in the industry for 10 plus years. And just trying to have fun with it realized that, it's not going to be. A Facebook or a Twitter at the moment, because first off I'm not that rich And second off we, we haven't been around that long. Give us some time give us a little bit of patience but really, help us by spreading the word and joining, signing up get some content on there. Just start chatting with people. The dollar a month, really, isn't a lot to ask, for all of the time and effort that we've put into it. And if you wanna help us grow, get a verified account. And 12 bucks a year is like buying me one drink at a bar. That's true. Yeah. That's a full year. When just buy the owner, a drink at the bar for the.

Eric: 50:36

Sounds good. Yeah, that's awesome. I've enjoyed my time on that platform. So it's a lot on

Neil: 50:42

there. I try to post but I think it's I go back and forth about posting on there. As the business owner I would rather focus my time on building the network and not posting on it. Then again, you have to build some engaging posts to get people to, comment and come back to the platform for sure. So it's a balancing act. Yes.

Gil: 51:09

I was gonna say almost make a generic one, like Tom, from my space where everyone's first friend was Tom. That's how your welcoming is.

Eric: 51:19

And we're gonna be doing some stuff together as far as like sponsorship and all that other stuff going on.

Neil: 51:25

Yep. I'm happy because I got a couple of opportunities to be able to increase my financial stability. And I feel like supporting the adult content group or community is important, to give back. If we can help at least in a small part by sponsoring you guys in what you do, then we can be a part of something and help each other, which is, the whole point in this building, this social network.

Eric: 51:55

Absolutely. And we thank you so

Neil: 51:57

much. Yes. Thank you. Talking, we'll be really happy to do that. And in the future when, it ends up getting bigger, we'll definitely be a much larger sponsor.

Eric: 52:06

Yeah, that's definitely when and when we get bigger, we'll be advertise. We'll be advertising a lot for you guys as it is yep. And we would love to have any content creators from adult social media on here. So if you guys want to be guests on our podcast, we would love to have you.

Neil: 52:24

Yeah. Any content creators that end up on your podcast the adult social media, get them a free model account for life. Okay. Any anyone that's interested and they want us get their start in the, adult content creator community. They don't know, how to get that following. Get on the queue lounge podcast will get you your free model account for life and hopefully help help you help us.

Eric: 52:53

Yeah, no, that would be great. I think that wonderful. Yeah, definitely. We will do that. How can people contact adult social media? What's the website? What are your socials that people can contact you for the website itself? I don't know if you wanna put your personal

Neil: 53:11

My, my personal cell phone number is You

Eric: 53:14

might have a stalker like me come after you.

Neil: 53:16

I'm kidding. no, it's it's theadultsocialmedia.com. Because just adult social media.com was like $80,000, literally. So I wasn't, I was gonna spend that. So theadultsocialmedia.com and we're also the adult social media on Instagram. And we are adult. Underscore med one on Twitter and adults, or, sorry. I'm trying to think. Yeah. Adult media a D U L T M E D I a on Facebook. Okay, awesome.

Eric: 53:51

And we'll get all those put into the show notes as well, so people can have direct links to all of that. Yes.

Neil: 53:58

So thank you so much. Yeah,

Eric: 54:01

of course. Thank you. And I just thank you so much for being a guest on our show and for just being an awesome badass person that you are, and yes. We really enjoy having you on thank you for that. Thank you.

Neil: 54:15

Thank you. Thank you, Eric. Love you guys. Hopefully we'll be on a third time here sooner than later. Yeah,

Eric: 54:21

absolutely. Yes, you're always welcome. Thank you everyone for listening and we'll catch you on the flip side.

Gil: 54:36

thank you for listening to us. We hope you enjoyed your time in The Q Lounge. If you have any questions, comments, suggestions on topics, or if you would like to be a guest or contributor, please email us info.TheQlounge@gmail.Com or through our contact page at theqloungepodcast.com. Don't forget to subscribe to continue listening wherever you get your podcasts. If you want to be our sugar, daddy hit that donation button.

Eric: 55:03

Until next time live in your authenticity.