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First it was dogging, then bluetoothing. Now a new British website helps amateurs become part-time sex workers. Jason Walsh investigates.
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England',s EBay for Sex. To revist this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories. To revist this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories. Just as myriad swingers sites allow soccer moms to commit adultery and married men to cheat with impunity, a new British website is helping people to become part-time prostitutes. Across Britain and Ireland plenty of people are willing to pay for sex -- and plenty more are willing to provide it, but until now it has largely been the domain of professional sex workers. Britain',s AdultWork website is plugging into the growing niche industry of sex-work dilettantes, people who spend a few hours a week in front of a camera, or in bed with a client, to augment their income -- or maybe even just because they like it. Sex and the internet have a long history. Besides pornography, there are plenty of sites where sex-starved people can hook up. AdultFriendFinder is the world',s most popular ",no-strings", sex site, with almost 17 million users. Others like Swingers Europe, Naughtynightlife.com and Swinger Zone are far from unpopular. And there are plenty of specialist sites too: Gaydar and Gay.com for gay hookups, URNotAlone for transsexuals and Alt for bondage and sadomasochism enthusiasts. But while these sites are just dating forums, AdultWork is an online clearinghouse for sex work. At present it has almost 3,000 members offering services, and several times that number buying or browsing. In addition to sex, the services on offer include webcam peep shows, homemade movies, phone sex and sex by cell-phone SMS. The site launched in late 2003 but had little immediate impact. It',s taken just under two years to rise to prominence. Users must create a free account to browse the services offered. Users can rate the services they',ve tried, or even offer their own services. Like eBay, AdultWork takes a cut of all transactions, which are processed through the web bank Nochex. Indeed, with its ratings honor system, AdultWork is something like an eBay for sex. And sex isn',t the only service available through the site. All the secondary occupations supporting it are also listed -- bodyguards, cleaners, receptionists, even web designers. Paid-for sex is a popular pastime in the United Kingdom. Recently published research in the Lancet medical journal found that one in 23 British men had paid for sex in the past five years, and there are about 80,000 sex workers in the United Kingdom. One of AdultWork',s part-time escorts is Melissa from Belfast. Melissa is an attractive, intelligent and well-read 20-year-old. A full-time student of communications, she is internet- and media-savvy -- a far cry from the clichéd call girl. ",I think what I do is very different to prostitution, well in my head, anyway,", she said. ",I guess it depends how you codify things -- everyone is a prostitute at some level. We',re all willing to whore some aspect of our body or soul for financial or material gains.", For Melissa, escorting is part-time work that provides good money. She insists it',s not sordid. ",Prostitution suggests standing on a street corner to feed a drug habit,", she said. ",I think of myself as a Holly Golightly, Breakfast at Tiffany',s kind of call girl. It',s been a bit of a fantasy for me to have this secret life that only I know about.", After clients make contact through the site or e-mail, Melissa usually visits them at their home or a hotel. As a full-time student, Melissa has to fit in escorting around her schedule, working mainly on weekends, which allows her to disguise what she does for a living: ",I have lots of friends, both male and female, none of whom know what I',m doing, but I find it easy to make and keep good friendships. I',m not a loner or anything.", For Melissa -- and thousands like her -- AdultWork breaks the underworld connections associated with sex work. In Northern Ireland, these connections can include terrorists. ",I am completely independent in my work, doing it for myself by myself -- I don',t pay cuts to any agent,", she said. ",I do know girls that work for agencies, which are really just terrorist-run brothels. The girls hand over around half of their money.", All kinds of people enjoy discreet, extramarital liaisons, now some of them are charging for it. Adultery has gone professional. Katie',s one of them. Katie describes herself as a BBW -- a ",big, beautiful woman.", A 45-year-old homemaker living in London, Katie has been working as a prostitute through AdultWork for three months. Katie said her husband thinks she works a few hours a week for part-time employment agencies and spends the rest of the time looking after their 10-year-old daughter. Instead she makes daytime visits to clients', homes for sex. ",I have a husband, and sex outside of my marriage is fun,", she said. ",He doesn',t know what I do, but I',m very careful STD-wise and really only do it once or twice a month. It',s not much different from having an affair.", Katie said treating part-time sex work as though it were an affair is ",pretty common.", She said she does it for the money -- ",I need to earn money so that I can afford to buy things,", she said -- but also enjoys the sex. ",OK, if a repellant guy is my client, it',s not ideal, but it',s not always like that,", she said. ",The internet is what makes it possible for me. I would never have joined an escort agency or worked in a brothel. So far as this is a business, which it',s not really, I',m my own boss.", The owners of AdultWork, AW Systems, remain a mystery. Despite being aimed at a British and Irish audience, the site is hosted from the Netherlands. Holland',s liberal laws allow sex for money to be openly promoted. Ironically, a similar site for the Dutch is a non-starter: Prostitution has already been normalized. ",The internet provides a means for those engaging in adult work to take control of their own destiny,", said an AW Systems representative calling herself Samantha. ",No longer do individuals have to work for a third party such as an escort agency. They are now at liberty to market their own services.", Samantha added: ",As far as we are concerned, the distinctions between amateurs and professionals have been blurred.", A British Home Office spokeswoman said prostitution is not illegal in the United Kingdom, but solicitation and pimping are -- and that AdultWork is pimping. ",Action would be a matter for the police,", she said. ",But if such a site was indeed U.K.-based, it could be shut down.", Avedon Carol, a spokeswoman for Feminists Against Censorship, said shutting down the site helps no one. ",Anything that gives women more power over their work would help,", she said. ",Stigmatizing sex, preventing women from being able to work together and so on, those things just make them more vulnerable.
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First it was dogging, then bluetoothing. Now a new British website helps amateurs become part-time sex workers. Jason Walsh investigates.
ENTER TO THE SITE
England',s EBay for Sex. To revist this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories. To revist this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories. Just as myriad swingers sites allow soccer moms to commit adultery and married men to cheat with impunity, a new British website is helping people to become part-time prostitutes. Across Britain and Ireland plenty of people are willing to pay for sex -- and plenty more are willing to provide it, but until now it has largely been the domain of professional sex workers. Britain',s AdultWork website is plugging into the growing niche industry of sex-work dilettantes, people who spend a few hours a week in front of a camera, or in bed with a client, to augment their income -- or maybe even just because they like it. Sex and the internet have a long history. Besides pornography, there are plenty of sites where sex-starved people can hook up. AdultFriendFinder is the world',s most popular ",no-strings", sex site, with almost 17 million users. Others like Swingers Europe, Naughtynightlife.com and Swinger Zone are far from unpopular. And there are plenty of specialist sites too: Gaydar and Gay.com for gay hookups, URNotAlone for transsexuals and Alt for bondage and sadomasochism enthusiasts. But while these sites are just dating forums, AdultWork is an online clearinghouse for sex work. At present it has almost 3,000 members offering services, and several times that number buying or browsing. In addition to sex, the services on offer include webcam peep shows, homemade movies, phone sex and sex by cell-phone SMS. The site launched in late 2003 but had little immediate impact. It',s taken just under two years to rise to prominence. Users must create a free account to browse the services offered. Users can rate the services they',ve tried, or even offer their own services. Like eBay, AdultWork takes a cut of all transactions, which are processed through the web bank Nochex. Indeed, with its ratings honor system, AdultWork is something like an eBay for sex. And sex isn',t the only service available through the site. All the secondary occupations supporting it are also listed -- bodyguards, cleaners, receptionists, even web designers. Paid-for sex is a popular pastime in the United Kingdom. Recently published research in the Lancet medical journal found that one in 23 British men had paid for sex in the past five years, and there are about 80,000 sex workers in the United Kingdom. One of AdultWork',s part-time escorts is Melissa from Belfast. Melissa is an attractive, intelligent and well-read 20-year-old. A full-time student of communications, she is internet- and media-savvy -- a far cry from the clichéd call girl. ",I think what I do is very different to prostitution, well in my head, anyway,", she said. ",I guess it depends how you codify things -- everyone is a prostitute at some level. We',re all willing to whore some aspect of our body or soul for financial or material gains.", For Melissa, escorting is part-time work that provides good money. She insists it',s not sordid. ",Prostitution suggests standing on a street corner to feed a drug habit,", she said. ",I think of myself as a Holly Golightly, Breakfast at Tiffany',s kind of call girl. It',s been a bit of a fantasy for me to have this secret life that only I know about.", After clients make contact through the site or e-mail, Melissa usually visits them at their home or a hotel. As a full-time student, Melissa has to fit in escorting around her schedule, working mainly on weekends, which allows her to disguise what she does for a living: ",I have lots of friends, both male and female, none of whom know what I',m doing, but I find it easy to make and keep good friendships. I',m not a loner or anything.", For Melissa -- and thousands like her -- AdultWork breaks the underworld connections associated with sex work. In Northern Ireland, these connections can include terrorists. ",I am completely independent in my work, doing it for myself by myself -- I don',t pay cuts to any agent,", she said. ",I do know girls that work for agencies, which are really just terrorist-run brothels. The girls hand over around half of their money.", All kinds of people enjoy discreet, extramarital liaisons, now some of them are charging for it. Adultery has gone professional. Katie',s one of them. Katie describes herself as a BBW -- a ",big, beautiful woman.", A 45-year-old homemaker living in London, Katie has been working as a prostitute through AdultWork for three months. Katie said her husband thinks she works a few hours a week for part-time employment agencies and spends the rest of the time looking after their 10-year-old daughter. Instead she makes daytime visits to clients', homes for sex. ",I have a husband, and sex outside of my marriage is fun,", she said. ",He doesn',t know what I do, but I',m very careful STD-wise and really only do it once or twice a month. It',s not much different from having an affair.", Katie said treating part-time sex work as though it were an affair is ",pretty common.", She said she does it for the money -- ",I need to earn money so that I can afford to buy things,", she said -- but also enjoys the sex. ",OK, if a repellant guy is my client, it',s not ideal, but it',s not always like that,", she said. ",The internet is what makes it possible for me. I would never have joined an escort agency or worked in a brothel. So far as this is a business, which it',s not really, I',m my own boss.", The owners of AdultWork, AW Systems, remain a mystery. Despite being aimed at a British and Irish audience, the site is hosted from the Netherlands. Holland',s liberal laws allow sex for money to be openly promoted. Ironically, a similar site for the Dutch is a non-starter: Prostitution has already been normalized. ",The internet provides a means for those engaging in adult work to take control of their own destiny,", said an AW Systems representative calling herself Samantha. ",No longer do individuals have to work for a third party such as an escort agency. They are now at liberty to market their own services.", Samantha added: ",As far as we are concerned, the distinctions between amateurs and professionals have been blurred.", A British Home Office spokeswoman said prostitution is not illegal in the United Kingdom, but solicitation and pimping are -- and that AdultWork is pimping. ",Action would be a matter for the police,", she said. ",But if such a site was indeed U.K.-based, it could be shut down.", Avedon Carol, a spokeswoman for Feminists Against Censorship, said shutting down the site helps no one. ",Anything that gives women more power over their work would help,", she said. ",Stigmatizing sex, preventing women from being able to work together and so on, those things just make them more vulnerable.
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