As a kid I helped a friend’s dad start a porn site (on the technical end) and I’ll tell you two things about it.
1. As someone with a decent reputation I get asked to a lot of meetings with people to discuss the "big ideas" of non-programmer types. In those meetings big numbers are always thrown around as to how much money can be made. The one porn project I’ve ever done is THE ONLY time I actually ended up with the big number that had been thrown around ($200,000 for 6 months work in case you were wondering)
2. Working on that site was one of the most fun projects I’ve ever had (and not because of the pornography). From a technical perspective porn pushes the boundaries more than any other area (except maybe pure research). It involves everything from telecommuting (allowing performers to do their jobs from home) to content delivery networks (my first experience with delivering a high number of quality video feeds) to social interaction (porn is more about an emotional reaction than anything else which requires studying how to create an immersive experience). It really does push all your skills.
I mean, in honesty, I wouldn’t do it now that I have some money behind me. But I don’t think there was anything wrong with it and I don’t feel bad about the experience.
As far as hiding your identity, it’s called a shell corporation and it’s not that hard. That said, you aren’t going to be able to completely hide your identity. Some people are going to have to know (you deal with a lot of vendors in that business). If you are going to the trouble of creating a new HN account it probably isn’t for you.
1. As someone with a decent reputation I get asked to a lot of meetings with people to discuss the "big ideas" of non-programmer types. In those meetings big numbers are always thrown around as to how much money can be made. The one porn project I’ve ever done is THE ONLY time I actually ended up with the big number that had been thrown around ($200,000 for 6 months work in case you were wondering)
2. Working on that site was one of the most fun projects I’ve ever had (and not because of the pornography). From a technical perspective porn pushes the boundaries more than any other area (except maybe pure research). It involves everything from telecommuting (allowing performers to do their jobs from home) to content delivery networks (my first experience with delivering a high number of quality video feeds) to social interaction (porn is more about an emotional reaction than anything else which requires studying how to create an immersive experience). It really does push all your skills.
I mean, in honesty, I wouldn’t do it now that I have some money behind me. But I don’t think there was anything wrong with it and I don’t feel bad about the experience.
As far as hiding your identity, it’s called a shell corporation and it’s not that hard. That said, you aren’t going to be able to completely hide your identity. Some people are going to have to know (you deal with a lot of vendors in that business). If you are going to the trouble of creating a new HN account it probably isn’t for you.