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BY ANDREW LEONARD | Captain Hollywood was a hot-linking, blind-linking, bandwidth-stealing cheater. In the online sex business, that meant he was breaking all the rules -- boosting his own Web site's advertising revenue via an arsenal of sneaky technology tricks. Or so claimed several of his competitors when they fingered Captain Hollywood two weeks ago on a bulletin board frequented by "adult" site Webmasters.

The real truth may never be known. Captain Hollywood pulled his Web pages down shortly after the accusations surfaced, and he declined to comment to the press about his alleged crimes against the online porn community. But his little escapade speaks to a larger truth about the overall health of the cybersex industry: A rising tide of sex-site techno-trickery threatens to swamp the so-called Adult Web.

This may come as a surprise to those whose main familiarity with online porn derives from mainstream media coverage -- where sensational stories keep breaking the astonishing news that Sex Sells on the Net! Sure, sex sells, especially when packaged with the ever-fresh attraction of new technology. But too much success breeds trouble, and the same technology that is your best buddy can turn around and bite you on the nude-model, free-live-video butt.

Crisis looms for the online porn biz, fueled by a volatile mixture of sex, technology and money. It's a crisis that demands attention even if you don't care whether every X-rated business on the Net folds up shop -- because the same bandwidth-filching, hit-nabbing tactics that are upending the online porn world today could easily show up in all of our browsers tomorrow.

"A lot of people out there making the big money right now are just scam artists, simple as that," wrote one participant on a bulletin board sponsored by the YNOT Network. "Until Webmasters remember and care what this business is supposed to be about, providing adult material to adults who want it, and doing so in an ethical and professional manner, Webmasters who play by the rules and maintain quality sites are going to be pulling their hair out and wondering why they are broke."

Broke? How can that be? Is this not, as Penthouse senior editor Gerard Van der Leun has decreed, the age of "Pornutopia?" Last summer's court-ordered rejection of the Communications Decency Act has led to an online pornographic surge of priapic proportions. Cyberculture defenders don't like to admit it, but the Web is clearly the most efficient delivery vehicle for lewd pictures yet devised by human beings. A year or two ago, lust-crazed surfers had to toil long and hard before locating the orgasmic aid of their desire. Today one need hardly break a virtual sweat. "Free pics" abound!

And that's precisely the problem. While news reports breathlessly declare that online porn is a billion-dollar-a-year-and-growing business, few observers are taking the time to note that supply is fast outpacing demand. Gold-rush fever, combined with the low barriers to entry typical for Web publishing, is putting the squeeze on profits. As Van der Leun notes, membership fees at the "pay sites" have been dropping steadily. A paltry $3.95 will now buy you a month's worth of all the streaming video feeds you can handle, and many sex sites also are offering a free week's membership as extra enticement to sign up.

"Clicks are harder to come by," moans one Webmaster. The result: a dramatic change in the online porn business model.

No one knows exactly how many commercial sex sites exist, but even the most conservative estimates are in the 20,000 to 30,000 range. No longer can sex site operators depend on traffic to come to them. Adult sites that charge for admission -- pay sites -- have to actively recruit traffic. And they're doing so by paying other sites to steer sex-seeking surfers into their welcoming Web arms.

"Click-through" -- the act of physically clicking on an advertising banner -- is the name of the game. All Web advertisers crave click-through traffic, and most are eager to pay a premium for whatever they can get. But in the sex-site business, click-through is absolutely essential. Porn pay-site operators care little for building "brand awareness," nor are they interested in how many eyeballs roll across their wittily animated banners. The categorical pay-site imperative is to bring the customer on site and get him or her signed up. And so a new breed of so-called click-through farmers has emerged to funnel traffic to the pay sites -- at rates as high as 15 cents a click.

Since it is not uncommon for a sex site, according to industry insiders, to register 60,000 "impressions" a day, the business of click-through farming can add up to big bucks. And yet many of these click-through farming sites are barely more than strings of banner advertisements. Since click-through farmers don't care about signing up permanent members, they attract their own traffic via free samples -- dramatically increasing the accessibility of graphic sexual images online and, paradoxically, helping to undermine the appeal of the pay sites that are funding them.

Click-through farming has spawned a network of businesses that focus on serving the needs of this peculiar trade. Companies such as SplitInfinity, WebSideStory and SexHound specialize in providing custom-made click-through tracking software, as well as "counter" programs for creating toplists that rank adult Web sites according to the traffic they attract and then deliver to other sites.

Click-through farming isn't necessarily easy money, on either side of the banner.

"A lot of advertising programs will drop you and not pay you a dime if you don't meet their sales quota," says Brian Mosier, Webmaster for Soft2Hard. "A lot of advertisers have no intention of ever paying anybody, and are out to make a quick few dollars and disappear, only to resurface under a new name and location. With no written contracts and no real law to enforce, it makes it hard to trust anyone."

"Then there are the free sites out just to rip advertisers off," adds Mosier, "by manufacturing clicks, multiple clicking devices, hidden clicks, hidden frames, consoles, etc. There are so many crooks on both sides that it makes it difficult for the honest and hard-working individuals out there."

This is where the fun begins. A first-time online porn surfer is likely to be bewildered by the bizarre transformations of his computer screen after an accidental stumble upon a mischievous click-through farming site. New browser windows spontaneously cascade across the monitor, seemingly of their own accord. Attempts to close the windows only seem to generate more windows, including persnickety Javascript-launched "consoles" that linger long after the original site has been left behind. Some links appear to go nowhere, or lead the confused surfer in endless circles through the same small group of sites.

Such is the cutting edge of Web technology, courtesy of constant sex-site experimentation. Sex and new technology have always been closely linked, from the invention of lithograph printing right on through to VCRs, camcorders and now the Web. Innovative adult Webmasters were among the first to embrace real-time video streaming technology and cryptographically authenticated password registration systems. Today, the latest fad is devising insidious tricks for manipulating and subverting click-through programming.

N E X T_P A G E | Secrets of the sex-site swindlers

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ILLUSTRATION BY BART NAGEL