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2257 Compliance Pains

Recently, XBIZ World magazine asked a group of industry leaders, "What was the most difficult part of updating your records to comply with the new 2257 federal record-keeping regulations?"

Here's what they had to say:

"The hardest part of the new 2257 law has been a lack of clarity in what the law demands. I have no idea who I can film, and what I can sell. Many pornographers are a little too optimistic about this law and they seem to be continuing with business as usual. I'm being very cautious. My big hope is that the Free Speech Coalition will be able to clarify the law and find some answers for us. We should all thank them for their work on our behalf."
— Michael Lucas, President, Lucas Entertainment

"Since we're a brand new company and our catalog has only eight titles so far, we were able to step into compliance very easily and we made the new regulations part of our procedures from the get-go. Plus, on set, we have performer ID's photographed up close digitally, so I can put them right on the net behind a secure server for immediate access to our resellers. The program I've built to handle 2257 is clean and basically automated, making it both easy for us and vendors."
— Keith O'Connor, Production Manager and Webmaster, Defiance Films

"Every company has been stressing out over the past few months. The phone has been ringing off the hook with people saying 'I need the release on this one and that one.' I was able to give out some of them, but we're going back to 1995, and in a lot of cases, these people aren't in the business anymore."
— Rob Spallone, President, Starworld Productions

"Luckily for us at MrSkinCash.com, all of our sites are celebrity-based and all the content is from mainstream movies. But we did have to check out all of our free sites and remove any content that was from paysite galleries that we didn't have records for. We also have a small amount of porn sets that I had to organize those records for. It made me understand how much work this is for large porn companies. I do not envy them with this new law."
— Derik Meklir, Vice President Marketing, Mrskincash.com

"The most difficult part of complying with the new 2257 regulations was tracking all content producers and getting the complete records. I noticed many of the producers were missing one or two records, so we had to play the run around until they just ended up giving us replacements, and we removed the ones that were missing documentation."
— Nader Fasheh, Owner, Nichepay

"Since we are all about the pre-1995 exempt classics, the biggest 2257 hurdle for us was to fully understand what was needed to provide all our webmasters and ourselves with proper documents supporting the exemption."
— Mike Hawk, Co-Owner, Smashbucks

"We have found the most difficult part of complying with 2257 regulations has been getting the primary producer to provide all the information for the models that are being displayed on our websites. The other issue was trying to match the model with the producer for the particular set that has been used in the website creation. This has led to purchasing all new content and rebuilding all sites, making costs literally outrageous!"
— Kourosh G., Marketing And Sales Director, Xxxcash.com

"Initially, organizing IDs and releases was an arduous process. Figuring out how to cross-reference everything was also a tough task, but we completed it all by the June 23 deadline. Now that we have a system in place, it will be easier moving forward and adding new studios and DVD titles to our site. It adds extra steps to the process, but I'll do whatever is necessary to adhere and comply with the new regulations."
— Jonathan Silverstein, Thecontentstore.com

"The most difficult part of complying with the new 2257 regulations is trying to figure out what the hell they actually mean, what they exactly want and how they interrelate with other laws, like the personal privacy of our talent. In terms of workload, we were already compliant with pre-existing 2257 interpretations, but preparing to distribute our records to secondary producers required scanning in all that paperwork for more than a thousand scenes — a real ass kicker, let me tell you."
— Kick Ass Vic, Webmaster, Kick Ass Pictures

"We've always operated under the 2257 guidelines, so it was just a question of adding cross-indexing information, like where our box covers are. As for the European model issue, we don't use them. I'd rather stay with American models. We don't shoot out of country like we have done in the past. Right now, we have no problem trying to help the government in any way we can. I do not believe in child porn. I am very, very against it."
— Corey Jordan, Owner, No Boundaries Entertainment

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