Calling All Cam Girls! Be Part of a Channel 4 Documentary...

I was contacted by Annabelle Draper from Back2Back productions regarding their latest documentary about cam girls and our industry. Following on from their very successful documentary about phone sex workers, (click here to view) they are looking to get in touch with women currently working the the industry who would like to contribute to the film with their opinions and experiences.

In my opinion this is a fantastic opportunity for girls who are looking to shine a spotlight on our industry and maybe show that there is no shame in doing what we do. Furthermore it could be a boost to your personal brand if you are featured.

The documentary will be tackling misconceptions about the industry, with our stories at the heart. To quote Annabelle directly:

"This will be a thoughtful and positive look at an industry which can be often misunderstood, and hopes to dispel myths and challenge any taboos that exist to date. Clean in content, with a light-hearted and warm tone, this documentary will get to know the real lives of the women behind the webcams,and is all about female empowerment. First and foremost, we want to focus on our contributors as people, as well as on the industry they work in, defying any preconceptions that may stand. 

Although there have been various forms of media on camming in the past, many have fixated on the cruder and 'sadder' stories of girls in camming which aim to patronise and belittle and I do not believe represents the majority of women in the industry! 

In particular we hope to hear from confident women who may receive or cater for some funny or unusual requests, not hard-core, just interesting or humorous. Also to tell the stories of these women, their backgrounds, other interests, otherwise ‘normal’ lives they lead who have made an intended decision to embrace the world of the web."

I was personally a fan of their work on the phone sex documentary and therefore happily invite any of my female, currently camming or considering camming readers to get in touch with Annabelle or Emma to share their stories and be potentially featured in an interesting and empowering look into our world.

If you do decide to take part and contact the girls them let me know in the comments! I will be excited to see how this turns out and hopefully see some of my readers representing us on Channel 4!

Much Love as always

London

x

...

Ok my lovelies, I have been quiet for a while and it is because my health again took a dramatic turn for the worse. At present I can hardly move from my bathroom floor, let alone get on cam or update this blog. It happened not long after I began working as a domme and I'm at a point now where there is just no way I can work in any physical capacity. My body is broken.

I have Beau to take care of me, but I'm going to be seeking private medical care as soon as I can afford it. Don't cam and live in London if you want to save money!

I want you all to know that while I am truly, very, very sick, I am still upbeat and rooting for you all. I'm grateful for your readership, your support of the blog, and of course for your beautiful emails that have touched me and made my dark days more bearable. Trust me that if I am ever able to return to this world and continue my adventures, I most definitely will!

Be safe, be smart and be kind to yourselves.

Much love

London

x

Watermarking - Benefits and Manycam Tutorial

The scourge of would be pirates... A watermark?!

Today I want to talk about protecting our privacy just that little bit more through the simple act of watermarking. Watermarking is something like an official seal that people use to display ownership and copyright items and intellectual property. The practice originates from the use of faint imprints on paper to prevent counterfeiting, and it is still used today on official documents like passports and security papers as well as on bank notes.

In the digital age many photographers will watermark their photographs through use of Photoshop to prevent their free use on other peoples websites. You will commonly see examples of watermarks when doing a Google image search for something that brings up a lot of stock image results. Stock photos will usually have the owner's website emblazoned across the image in transparent text, such as"Stockimages.com". The watermark shows who the photograph belongs to without too much distortion across the picture so that potential buyers can still clearly see the image before purchase.

You can also watermark and date your live webcam streams and video recordings by using some simple software. Watermarking your intellectual property is something that could help you if for any reason your live shows are illegally recorded, or your prerecorded videos are uploaded without your consent. The practice generally dissuades pirates from taking your videos as dates make it difficult for them to pose as a live camgirl and listing your camgirl name and site will give you additional publicity and make it easier for you to prove that you own the rights to the video. For photographs, again this means you can give a free preview of your pictures without making it easy for other sites or members to download and rip you off.

To watermark your photos without Photoshop I recommend using the website picmarkr.com. It is a free site that will allow you to create and add custom watermarks to your images. I won't go into great detail about how to use it, but if you are looking for a tutorial I suggest looking at this one.

For your custom video clips or any recordings you are making available online, one of the free and easy options to add a watermark is to use Windows Movie Maker. As I do not make pre-recorded content as of yet I couldn't tell you how to do this, but there is again an excellent tutorial available here that should answer any questions you might have.

For live streaming I would recommend downloading the free Manycam software here. Manycam is a free program that can add many effects to your camera while streaming live and is also a camsplitter so it enables you to broadcast on several sites simultaneously.

To create your watermark with ManyCam there are several things you will need to do. First of all you will need to make sure you are streaming your camera through the application itself. To do this you must click the video tab at the top of the window, then click on the sources tab, and finally select your webcam from the drop down camera menu underlined in red on the illustration below.

Once you have got your camera streaming properly, you will need to get rid of the ugly logo that Manycams uses as its watermark when you start the program for the first time. To do this you will need to click on the effects tab, next to the sources tab you selected earlier. You then select the text over video function option and un-check the "Show Manycams Logo" box that the red arrow is pointing to below. This will remove the logo circled in the bottom right of the cam stream.

When the logo is gone you can create your own watermark by checking the "Enable text" box circled in the bottom left of the image below. This allows you to write directly into the text box above it and your message will appear in the cam stream window. You can change the font size, colour, style and transparency with the tool bar above the text box, as well as adjust the colour and transparency of the text background. You can also position your watermark by left clicking and holding the mouse button to drag it wherever you like on your cam window. When you are satisfied with the position, release the left mouse button to drop it.

To time stamp your live shows you will need to select the date and time option that sits just below the text over video option we picked before in the left hand menu. When you have selected this option, to enable the time and date you will need to check the "Show clock" box circled in red below and select a time and date format from the options that are available. In my case I have selected the DD/MM/YY option along with the 24 hour clock to make my time stamp as small as possible. To change the position of the clock, drag and drop in the same way you did with your watermark.

Once this is complete you are basically ready to go. You can start streaming live with the knowledge that your work is watermarked. To stream through Manycam you will need to ensure it is running and select it instead of your webcam when choosing what to stream. I have used my Skype video settings as an example below. To make sure that anyone I Skype with can see my watermark, I have selected the ManyCam Virtual Webcam instead of the usual HP Webcam I would use. Be sure this is selected with all your show streaming software such as the flash encoder, JustCamIt and and MFC software.

To use ManyCam software for watermarking you will need to have it running in the background. Once it is open, even if you close the application it will still be running in the hidden icons tray in the bottom right of the screen in your task bar (Assuming you are running a Windows OS and not a Mac. I am not a Mac user so I am afraid you guys are own your own here!). Keeping it open gives you the option to alter your text and use different effects during a show, but closing the screen and having it running in the background is fine and will ensure that your watermark remains.

So there you have it. I hope you have found this post somewhat helpful. I use a watermark in all my shows now as an extra precaution, and it has made me feel more confident about tackling potential piracy. While we must remember it does not remove the threat entirely, it does protect us that little bit more and helps when sending a DCMA.

Be safe and be blessed!

Much love,

London

xox

New beginning for Mistress London...

Ok so about a month ago I said I would be writing less because I was bowing out of the cam girl game due to health issues. While I'm still not in peak condition, after a considerable break I am going to return to camming with the support of my Beau. It's tentative, but I think I can find the energy for a bit of work each week.

I finally told Beau about the source of my income and he's been nothing but supportive. He was a little apprehensive at first, but ultimately proud of me. We have decided to put any of my earnings into a savings account to pay for private medical treatment in the hopes that I will have access to better diagnostic tests and drugs than currently available on the NHS.

I'm going for a totally new angle this time in my work, and I want to specialise in fetishes and domination. After such a long break and all the harassment from my "friends" who knew my screen name, I have decided to try some new sites, block the UK, take on a new name and attempt to work my way up from the bottom with an entirely new angle.

I'm naturally a demanding bitch and I do genuinely enjoy domination so I'm excited to incorporate this into my shows, and I feel excited to be getting back into the game and experimenting with my work, taking it in a whole new direction. I'm intrigued to see if I make more money as a domme than I did as a girl next door so we can consider this an experiment. I have already worked out my persona and she is a stone cold fox!

So while the blog may be updated only sporadically, I will do my best to let you know how my experiment goes and the tips and tricks I pick up along the way.

Thanks for sticking with me ladies. You are my constant inspiration.

Also Beau told me to post this...



This is why I love him. He is the cheesiest man I have ever met!

Much Love

Mistress London

xox

This isn't goodbye...

Hello Friends

This is London making contact after a long bout of radio silence. For that I am sorry.

This post is difficult for me to write because it is sad, and I have been putting it off for quite some time.

As many of you who have diligently read and followed my blog are aware, I suffer with a long term illness. Last year I began to deteriorate rapidly, and to be honest it was touch and go. It started when I collapsed in the club bathroom at my own birthday night out, and I just haven't been able to bounce back since.

Everything has taken a backseat to my recovery. I dropped out of school, I started more and more drug therapies that did nothing but make me sicker, and of course I had to stop camming. I even pushed Beau away because I couldn't imagine why someone would want to stick around through all the hospital appointments, and the depressing sight of me reduced to sleeping on my bathroom floor.

I ran away from everything. I ran away from London and went back to my parents in the city I grew up in. I watched the city disappear behind me as quickly as my life had disappeared.

You never expect illness to dominate you, you never expect the bad flares, but the truth is when you live in remission, they are always waiting.

This blog has meant so much to me. To be able to connect with all these wonderful people, to hear all your stories and share in your successes has been a privilege and a joy. I love doing this and I wish I could do more, but the fact remains that I'm still a long way from remission and I'm not camming. I would feel like a fraud advising you when I'm not currently in the industry, because it's like a living organism, always growing and changing.

You can still email me, and check the blog for updates, but the posting will be sporadic, and I haven't been responding to emails due to my ill health. Even sitting at a computer has felt too much for me on days. But trust me when I say it's not all doom and gloom and I'm still alive and kicking and I'm not defeated yet.

And for those of you who are worried about Beau... don't be. I pushed him away, but he was having none of it. He and I are stronger than ever and I don't know what I would be doing right now without him. I could have faced my journey alone, but I'm so glad I didn't have to. Thank god he had a bit more faith than I did!

So this is just an update really to explain things. I also want to apologise to anyone who has emailed me and hasn't had a response. I read all my emails on my phone, its just hard to write them without getting to a computer. If you have a question regarding cam advice, do look through my advice list, and if it relates to me, take a look at the FAQ section. A lot of the emails I get have questions that I have already created entire posts about so please make sure to check through the advice section because you may well get the answer you are looking for.

Thanks for reading and supporting the blog my friends. Your passion and love has helped me through some of my darker moments. Please be blessed with wealth, health and happiness, and know I think of you often. And shake that booty for me until I'm back on my feet!

Much love

London

x

Something for the gents... Male Model post

Mmmmm...

Since September last year my inbox has been filling up more and more with emails from aspiring male models looking for advice on entering the cam modelling world. I am really pleased to know that so many guys are reading the blog and so because of this repeated request I have decided to attempt this issue in a post.

I have been reluctant to do this in the past for several reasons, the main one being that I think the best people to give advice and advocate are male models working in the industry. As a white, heterosexual, cisgendered woman I can only offer a limited view of what the industry really is. We need voices to represent the rainbow of participants and build a strong advice community that values and respects our different experiences.

Another reason I haven't done a male centric post is because there is little information out there that I can find specifically relating to guys. Some of the advice on my blogs regarding technology and etiquette can be applied across the board. But for more specific stuff regarding gay sites and what female customers want, I wouldn't feel right telling men what is popular because I simply don't know. I have never used a cam site to talk to a guy and as I am not a gay male I can't tell you what it's like from my experience which is what a lot of my posts boil down to. I also can't give you pay rates for most of the male model sites because again I can't apply for them with no identification.

The site I used to work for, internet modeling does take on male models. They never treated me badly, but the pay wasn't the best out there for female models. As I can't gather data for what the male sites pay this may be a good option for some of the guys out there.

 Some of the top sites that come up for male models are:

Webcamguys.com - This is the site that internet modeling will put you on.
Cameraboys.com - This site is the male version of LiveJasmin. I haven't heard great things about LJ from the ladies, but I have no rates for the boys. Assuming it is the same it's not great.
ModelXlive.com - This looks like a streamate affiliate similar to internetmodeling so wouldn't surprise me if the rates were the same.

I really can't say what the best paying site is for guys. I don't know if the rates change for men, as they are in less demand than female models. My advice is to sign up with as many as possible and find out all their rates. See who treats you best and when you find a site that has a decent commision on top of good traffic then make it your home!

Regarding your customer base, if you are a straight male, be aware that the majority of you clients will be gay men. I would hope you already know that because if you go into it thinking otherwise you are naive. You should be comfortable with having online sexual encounters with men and if you aren't then web cam modelling probably isn't for you. In the same breath if you are gay it is possible you will encounter female customers and you should also ideally be comfortable having online sexual encounters with them. Sexuality in this industry must be somewhat fluid to make the most money.

You should also be prepared to be asked to perform the same stuff females get asked to do like anal play and deep throating. You should consider getting your own selection of toys and fetish costumes, if you haven't already, to cater to niche markets. Ideally you will work out how you really feel about these sort of things beforehand because its more than likely to come up pretty fast. (I have a post on faking anal if it's really not your thing.)

If you are looking for a useful male model tutorial, my old site also has tips for new male models here. I found their tutorials very helpful when I was starting out so hopefully you will find the same.

Alot of the stuff is common sense and applicable to all of us. Smile, flirt, don't look bored, keep chatting, play games, keep bringing the conversation back to sex, the usual.

My final thought for the night is that if you are a guy reading this, or a woman, cisgendered or transgendered, heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, Asian, Black, White, Hispanic, and you have views and experiences to share on camming please start a blog! People need to hear what you have to say, especially you men. This is one of the few industries in which women usually make more money than their male counterparts, (models not executives I will point out.) and there is very little information out there on the subject. If this simple gal from London town can start a blog and be heard, why not you?

I wish all my readers, male, female, intersex, whatever, the best of luck in all their endeavours and much health and wealth and happiness!

Much love

London

x

Camming and Escorting

Hi Ladies,

It has been a while.I don't have as much time for the blog as I did previously, but I will go into more details on that another time. A topic that has been coming into my inbox regularly as of late is escorting. A number of girls are writing to ask if I escort, and if this is something common in the community. I know many of you will be looking into this as debts mount and the sites remain quiet, so I wanted to present you with my opinion on the subject in the hopes that it will help you make the best decision for you.

An escort is defined by the dictionary as one of three things:

• a. One or more persons accompanying another to guide, protect, or show honour.
• b. A man who is the companion of a woman, especially on a social occasion.
• c. A person, often a prostitute, who is hired to spend time with another as a companion.

Definition C is the what we are discussing so let us first consider the fact that it describes an escort as someone who is hired to spend time with another as a companion. Legally, in many countries and the majority of American states, you are not allowed to pay another person for sex. Escorts work around this by saying they are being paid for their time and that anything of a sexual nature that occurs during this time it is at their discretion and between two consenting adults.

I appreciate that there will be some escorts that do not sleep with their clients, but I would bet good money this is very small percentage. You will be expected to perform sex acts as an escort, so in truth it is better to realise you are getting yourself into the world of prostitution and solicitation. You are being paid to have sex with people, regardless of the way it is dressed up. If it wasn't about sex then the escorts ads online wouldn't outline what they will and wont do in the bedroom. If you want to get into this, go in with your eyes wide open for your own safety.

So knowing that this particular branch of sex work is shady at best in legal terms, is this something you really want to risk doing? There is always a chance of being booked for solicitation, and do you really want a criminal record associated with sex work? It is not going to be helpful should you want to change careers later on.

Career prospects and legal issues aside, one of the most important things to consider if your personal safety. Escorting (which I will now refer to as prostitution) is dangerous and therefore you really need to think about what you are truly getting yourself into. Prostitution is the most dangerous profession in America. 204 out of every 100,000 prostitutes are murdered in America alone, and considering there are 40 million prostitutes world wide, that is a lot of death*.

Even with agencies there is no guarantee of safety. If it doesn't kill you, then you are still almost promised violence of a physical and sexual nature. A psychologist called Farley has done numerous studies of prostitution and found some tragic statistics related to the violence perpetrated against these women**:

• 82% of respondents had been physically assaulted since entering prostitution.
• 68% of respondents reported that they had been raped since entering prostitution.
• 48% of the respondents who had been raped, stated they had been raped more than 5 times.

It brings tears to my eyes to know nearly half of those women were raped over five times. Take a moment here and really think about those statistics and the people behind them and what they actually mean. If the physical assault of prostitution isn't enough, then what about the emotional impact? What happens to our minds when the industry takes its toll? In another study conducted in 1998, Farley found that two thirds of prostitutes suffered with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). The number suffering with the condition was twice as high as Vietnam veteran suffering with the disorder, and the severity of the symptoms - emotional numbness, recurrent nightmares and flashbacks - was also more extreme than among the treatment seeking veterans***.

I would never judge another human being for working as a prostitute, and I know sometimes there seems to be few options in the world left open. I just know for me the emotional impact would be too much. I have had the opportunity to escort, but I have always declined, even when offered huge sums of money because in part I like to still be able to say I have never slept with anyone for money. Actual sex is something just for the lovers I choose to take. It's not a commercial exchange. It's a boundary I will never cross.

The other reason I don't escort is because I don't trust men who buy sex. I know they aren't all bad, blah blah blah, but I don't trust the majority of those men to see me as a human being. I believe they see me as a sexual object for their gratification and I believe that even though I may get away with a few decent men, for every one of those, there will be two who will turn out to be rapists, or violent, or thieves, or stalkers or murderers. Men who will buy me to exert their power over the "weaker" sex. Some of those men display their darker nature to me online, but thankfully I'm safely tucked away on the other side of the Atlantic for the most part.

None of us deserve violence or sexual assault in our lives, and regardless of whether you are a sex worker, a homemaker, or just a single girl who is a little bit drunk and out of the town, no one asks for it. I am not at all into victim blaming, but lets keep ourselves safe where we can in this situation. Don't put yourself in harms way. As grown women, we all make our choices, but we all deserve better than this. The studies do not have promising results and sadly, there is rarely any form of gain for women in the sex industry. It is all too often romanticised by the few fortunate enough to make a lot of money or have a good experience, (*cough* Secret Diary of a Call Girl *cough cough* Bell Du Jour *cough cough cough*) but the are in an extreme minority. Most sex workers stay poor. Most prostitutes are assaulted. I haven't even gotten into the risks of STD's, but of course that is always there even with a condom. Plus if you are raped, then chances are there will be no condom use anyway.

I think of you girls often when I'm working and out with Beau. Many of you have touched my heart deeply with your stories and I can't bear to think of you in such a dangerous situation. I trust you all to make your own decisions, but please consider this one carefully if it has been on your mind. Camming and phone sex are the safest ways to work in the sex industry, they keep you physically safe and you can switch it off and be done with it at any point. I want you to have the option to walk away from the sex industry with as little regret and as few scars as possible.

Be safe.

Much love

London

x

Sources:
* This previously contained a link to the onlineschool with their statistics. The owner of the link was in my opinion an absolute prick about my site and he demanded I take down the link based on "information Google was providing," stating I have dodgy dealings with the links on my site. All unfounded bollocks and most likely simple prejudice against a site with adult content. If you would like the link to these statistics please email me at londoncamgirl@gmail.com 
** http://womensissues.about.com/od/rapesexualassault/a/Wuornos.htm
*** Female Chauvinist Pigs - Ariel Levy - 2005