"I'm not a lawyer. Chances are you're not a lawyer either. If we were lawyers, we would know that it's absurd to be in the porn business without concern for legal ramifications."

You're a big-time adult webmaster. You make a hell of a nice living. You set your own hours. You got cash for bling and you get to look at titties and cooches all damned day. You're styling on the edge of Internet bizazz. You're living the pimp life and nothing can catch you. You're free to do as you please 'cause you live in the United States of America! You got the First Amendment, baby! As long as you pay your taxes and drive responsibly, the man will never bring you down again! Pinch you! You must be dreaming!

Wake up clueless, little pimp.

If you are an adult webmaster and you live in America, you are vulnerable to prosecution. It doesn't matter if you live in New York City or Yuma, Arizona. Wherever you reside, if your home is in the US, you're just a search warrant away from a legal and financial nightmare.

I'm not a lawyer. Chances are you're not a lawyer either. If we were lawyers, we would know that it's absurd to be in the porn business without concern for legal ramifications. If you and I were lawyers, we'd realize that when it comes to obscenity, most of us are innocent until proven guilty.

Here's how obscenity laws work in America:

1. The First Amendment to the US Constitution - the part that concerns our industry- states:

" Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press..."

2. However, the US Supreme Court Ruled in ROTH v. UNITED STATES -1957:

"Obscenity is not within the area of constitutionally protected freedom of speech or press - either (1) under the First Amendment, as to the Federal Government, or (2) under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, as to the States." Now, let that sink in for a minute. America has free speech but obscenity is not free speech.

Now, here comes the tricky part. The Supreme Court has never ever delivered a precise definition of obscenity. The closest the court has come to characterizing obscenity is the Miller Test. The Miller test is a set of guidelines issued by the court in MILLER v. CALIFORNIA -1973. This is the Miller test:

Whether the average person, applying contemporary community standards, would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest,

Whether the work depicts/describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by applicable state law,

Whether the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.

See? See what the SCOTUS did there? They totally passed the responsibility of defining obscenity to the individual States and city governments. Note the phrases: "applying contemporary community standards" and " specifically defined by applicable state law".

What this means is that you are bound by the laws of the city, county and state where you live. You can fight for your freedom of speech all the way to the Supreme Court but you're going to have to pass through charges, a trial, a jury of your peers and a lot of lower courts to get there.

The trap lurks within the ambiguity of the language in the Miller test. Take the word "prurient". The synonyms for it (nasty, disgusting, revolting) are just as nebulous. Now imagine that Sheriff JoeBob finds out you've been selling ass-to-mouth and bukkake memberships right out of your den, right under his nose. Maybe your church-going, porn-hating bank teller filed a complaint with Sheriff JoeBob. Both JoeBob and Miss Bank Teller think your dirty Interweb pictures are prurient! Guess who is going to court?

But you live in a major metropolitan city! That could never happen to you! Your town is too open-minded for that kind of crap. Really? Got any state or county elections coming up? Have you promoted your Internet venture through local media channels? Are you a little bit infamous?

Consider Dallas, TX. Make fun, but out of the 10 most populated cities in the US, three of them are located in Texas. So, consider Dallas. In 2002, Thomas Korosec of The Dallas Observer wrote an article entitled: "The Naked Truth". These excerpts should clearly explain how susceptible the most ephemeral porn player is to prosecution/persecution:

"Although roughly two dozen stores around Dallas rent or sell movies depicting unsimulated sexual acts between consenting adults and are licensed to do so under city codes, Dallas police vice officers routinely wander into the stores, pick out one or two particularly graphic titles and file misdemeanor promotion-of-obscenity charges against the clerk who rang up the sale.

That's right. The clerk. Not the owners...

...Over the past 18 months, 14 clerks working at New Fine Arts Video's two Dallas stores have picked up 22 movie-related obscenity charges, each punishable by up to a year in jail and a $4,000 fine. Woodson's came last August, when undercover vice officer Craig Reynerson plunked down $43.50 for Euro Angels #20, a six-scene European title featuring a lot of close-ups of some decidedly unromantic sex."

Does that scare you? Well, it should. It should at least make you wake the hell up. As you probably know, members from our Industry have been under the gun recently. This time, the heat is coming from both locals and Feds. There's a brand new porn posse on the prowl and they're not looking to party. Election campaigns are sprouting up all over. We've evaded the zealouts for far too long and the showdowns are due.

That's why I'm not done scaring you. An obscenity indictment is serious fucking stuff. I've been reading webmaster comments on this topic for over seven years and many of you still DON'T GET IT. I want you to understand why the adult Internet is a HIGH-RISK PROFESSION.

Come back for Part #2 of Obscenely Clueless! I've got Adult Internet lawyer; Lawrence Walters to provide some more shock and awe!

** Click Here For: Obscenely Clueless! - Part #2