Ted’s Tubes: Backpage Backlash, Broadband Speed and The Million Dollar Free Movie

Village Voice Media Under Increased Pressure to Drop Backpage Sex Ads

Two years ago State Attorney Generals pressured Craigslist to drop adult oriented advertisements which reportedly generated approximately $36 million in revenue annually for the online classified giant.  The advertisements and pressure have now migrated to Village Voice’s Backpage.com.   H&M, Pfitzer Pharmaceutical, IKEA, Barnes and Noble, Best Buy and the Miami Dolphins have all pulled ads from Village Voice in response to a Change.org campaign.  Now some Senators are calling for Backpage.com to drop the ads.   TechDirt, however, has argued that such a move is counterproductive since it only makes it more difficult for law enforcement to track sexual predators.

In other words, such a crackdown won’t do a damn thing to stop people from actually being exploited. Even worse, in pressuring that content to scatter, it becomes much more difficult for law enforcement to track down and arrest the real criminals who are abusing the system. But nothing in getting Backpage to turn off this section actually helps to stop such trafficking/prostitution. It just makes life that much more difficult for law enforcement, since they now need to do a lot more work to track down the people abusing these laws. I fail to see how that’s a positive result, as the government has insisted.

The qualification of a California ballot proposition on sex trafficking for this November, means this issue will only get hotter for Village Voice.

More info:  Brands Boycott Village Voice’s Backpage Over Sex Trafficking (Brand Channel); Misguided Senators Propose Plan To Make It Harder For Law Enforcement To Track Down Human Trafficking Online (Tech Dirt)

Free Movie Premiers Online and Nets $1MM in 14 Days

The movie “Hungry for Change” was free for 10 days and netted 453,841 likes during the free period and over $1 million in the first 14 days.  The revenue came from DVD orders for the documentary, many from people who had viewed the film free.

TechDirt details the strategy behind the film’s initial success.

Akamai State of the Internet:  South Korea, Delaware #1

In Akamai’s quarterly state of the Internet report, South Korea came in first in terms of average overall and fastest broadband speeds, while Delaware came in first in both categories in the U.S.   The U.S. finished 10th and 13th respectively.

The table below shows the progression of average broadband speeds over 2009-2011 for the U.S. and several other countries, with current U.S. speeds unable to match 2009 speeds for Japan and South Korea (let alone the current speeds).