My editors let me slip a blow job into the column this week. Thanks guys!
The scary part about taking your sex-tech project to the mainstream is that on the long, hard journey from quirky to safe, you risk wrecking the very thing that made you special.
Then, when the Bowdlerized version doesn’t do well, the backlash affects everyone in the sex-tech space, not just the particular application or product. “See?” say the analysts and the venture capitalists and the advertisers. “That’s why we don’t back sex things.”
Then when there’s a new sex thing they cautiously express interest about, the developers bend over backwards to show how nonthreatening and comfortable it really is.
Ah, the cycle of romantic startups.
6 responses so far ↓
1 carpeweb // Jun 19, 2008 at 11:50 pm
Shouldn’t it be called a brother app and not a sister app? Or am I being too genderist?
2 carpeweb // Jun 19, 2008 at 11:52 pm
shouldn’t that be a brother app and not a sister app? Am I genderist?
3 chiraven // Jun 20, 2008 at 8:15 pm
OMG. You mean that a GUY tried to do a site like this for WOMEN? Is he out of his frickin’ MIND? Regina, you should have volunteered to be a consultant (for a suitable fee, of course) to get him on the right track.
Face it. We guys have about zero clues how to put something like that together that will reach the target audience in a meaningful way. Those of us who even get it a LITTLE bit are too busy with more dates than we can handle to have time to work on a project like that. This DEFINITELY needs a woman’s touch.
4 regina lynn // Jun 24, 2008 at 2:06 pm
Well, they are looking for a woman to take the helm. I’d do it, for $150,000/year plus four weeks’ vacation and two associate editors and one production assistant to carry out what actually has to happen to make it work. (I’m assuming they already have their wonderful programmers/developers in place.)
But somehow all these web number-oh sites balk at my price …
5 chiraven // Jun 24, 2008 at 2:33 pm
You’re THE expert in this area, Regina. Go for a consulting gig at, say, $250/hour plus expenses (that’s relatively modest … you may need to ask for more) with a solid week or two at the start to set them on track. Plus a contract for a periodic content and policy review, say, every six months or so. And then they can call you in whenever they get in over their heads. Let THEM worry about the gophers. If they pick people you can’t do anything with, just tell them that.
It’s called the “Pro from Dover” syndrome. Nice work.
6 regina lynn // Jun 24, 2008 at 9:52 pm
LOL Jim – I tend to use brother/sister interchangeably, alternating … but perhaps henceforth I should say sibling?