SpecimensAtTheRanch.com Ch. 02

The Website

Eric thought he would experiment to see how much of a revenue stream he could generate with his isolated ranch. Seeing the popularity of those inane reality shows on TV, he thought a merger of reality and porn could draw a huge following. Boy, was he right.

Being independently wealthy, all of the infrastructure was easy to finance from resources on hand. Including:

The Ranch itself

An onsite server farm

Multiple cameras around, fed into the server farm

Multi-terabyte internet trunk pulled across miles of desert

Proprietary encoding scheme

On the fly encryption

Dedicated online decrypting video player, eliminating pirating

A small rural ISP, upgraded to a tightly controlled VPN to mask all traffic

Though the PowerBand made this seem unnecessary, every Specimen signed a performance release. Each specimen read the full release in front of a camera and their casual acceptance of it's outlandish requirements was recorded. Pay was limited to room and board. All publishing rights were relinquished. All specimens agreed to free association sexual conduct with all other specimens. Specimens acknowledged 24X7 video surveillance, then promptly forgot about its existence.

Every specimen was highlighted with their own overview page. The web page included a small set of explicit photographs. A physical description including vital dimensions was detailed. Each specimen recorded a frank description of their sexual preferences. This personal record was presented alongside the reading of their performance release. A viewer score was prominently presented. Links to samples of their high-ranking sexual encounters helped paying customers decide who their favorite specimen might be. Also displayed was an interactive map so dedicated fans could easily locate and track their favorite specimen. The map listed all active cameras so browsing patrons could scout out current action.

Sexual escapades were ranked by several factors, including the number of live viewers, average length of viewing sessions, number of delayed downloads, number of live upvotes, and the number of hookups with other high scoring participants.

Individual specimen score was determined by the following. Live up votes, delayed up votes, overall viewership, average daily number of different sexual partners. Sexual encounters with higher ranking specimens would increase a specimen's score. Sex with lower ranked specimens could possibly lower someone's score, depending on any up votes that might accompany said sexual conduct. Specimens had no idea they were being ranked, so none had any incentive to game their score. Ranking was merely a game to keep the viewers engaged. Eric rarely intervened in the specimen's social-sexual interactions. Once he brought a new specimen in, he would give them their initial set of urges and inclinations and set them free.

Customers could opt for two payment models, subscription, or hourly. The first hour was always free. Additional time could be bought in individual hours, with discounts for block purchases. Subscriptions were sold as basic or premium. A basic subscription allowed access to most of the common areas of the Ranch, plus a subset of the private living areas. Multiple premium subscriptions varied in what additional content was included. The most popular premium subscription included the bedrooms of the most highly ranked specimens. Other premium options served special interests, such as the workout center, the showers, massage rooms, worker bee quarters, etc. One surprisingly popular option was the toilet channel. Go figure.

Though expensive, the top of the line subscription was the all-cam option. Those viewers could see any covered space at the Ranch. For an additional fee, a lonely or obsessed customer could have their feed automatically follow an individual specimen about. They could track a favorite person and voyeur on their most private moments. Although this could be considered preying on people's weaknesses, some people fell in love with certain specimens. They would pay exorbitant fees to be closer to someone they loved. Eric was merely providing a service.

All the web streaming was handled by an onsite server farm. High speed switches managed the incoming requests and fed the content out through the multi-terabyte fiber trunk dedicated to the Ranch traffic. All video was on-the-fly encoded with a proprietary encoding scheme. Then only a key driven, browser embedded video player could view the content. They keys rotated frequently, so only paying customers could view the content. Key were tied to specific MAC addresses, so viewing was limited to individual devices: no key sharing. Occasional watermarked clips were distributed through the various free porn services to stimulate traffic.

Eric purchased a small rural ISP. He ran it in place and kept the service top notch with enviously low service fees. The local customers were all quite happy and asked no questions. This gave him a place to hide a super secure VPN, dedicated to keeping the whereabouts of the Ranch hidden.

Given that his talent worked for free, the whole operation turned a fat profit. Laundered through cryptocurrency and banked offshore, all of it was out of reach of any authority. Double encryption of all business records made sure that any breach of security ended in a walled garden of obscurity.