YNOT’s new website has finally been launched, and I thought it might be fun to talk with the former Editor-in-Chief, YNOT’s own Jay “LAJ”. Jay served as Editor-in-Chief of YNOT News for two years before he was promoted to YNOT Vice President in 2004. So here’s how the conversation went, from YNOT’s current Editor-in-Chief to YNOT’s previous Editor-in-Chief:CY: Until this past week YNOT has always delivered news in a weekly format. You spent two years as the Editor-in-Chief of YNOT News before your promotion, so you have to have some strong feelings about the new changes here at YNOT. So what are your thoughts now that the old weekly format is history? This was, I believe, a change you had been wanting for quite some time.

LAJ: I’m thrilled that the weekly format is history, as it shows that we are growing. I had been pushing for the daily format during the latter half of my two years as YNOT News Editor-in-Chief and had a list of ideas on how it should function, but due to priorities, it was a project that needed to be pushed back a bit. I’m just glad that my shared vision carried on through you, and that the timing with the launch of the new YNOT.com will make the daily format a reality. Timing is everything so the fact that this is happening now means that we are truly ready to support a daily news format.

CY: What do you miss most about the time you spent as Editor-in-Chief of YNOT News, and what would you say was your biggest accomplishment?

LAJ: I miss the weekly challenges of meeting deadlines (but not always!), staying completely on top of major breaking news stories, and managing the works of dozens of freelance writers was also fun and interesting work. Each week brought new challenges and a new editorial from me. As far as writing and editing goes, I was mostly on my own which made being the Editor-in-Chief a very satisfying albeit somewhat stressful experience at times.

LAJ: I’d have to say my biggest accomplishments with the YNOT News were both professional and personal. When I took the position of Editor-in-Chief, I dove into the deep end headfirst and made the transition from former EIC Judd Handler to myself as seamless as possible. Practically every aspect of the YNOT News was a first for me. When I took over, I had never run a publication before or managed writers, ever. My HTML skills at the time were nonexistent, and I wasn’t used to weekly deadlines to this magnitude. Being able to hit the ground running and keep it running full steam ahead for two years was a tremendous accomplishment for me personally. Professionally, I brought a lot more brand awareness to YNOT through YNOT News and I got our articles syndicated on several chat board sites and more daily traffic coming to YNOT. The fact that I have always been a public figure really helped further secure YNOT News as a solid source for news, articles and tutorials in our rapidly changing industry. To this day people still associate me with the publication even though I’m only a once in a while contributor at this point.

CY: You wrote quite a few editorials over the years. Do any stick out in your mind as getting an unusually strong response compared to others?

LAJ: Absolutely. You always remember the work you get the most “hate” mail on as well as those where you get the most praise and requests for reprints and archived links. Several years back I wrote a piece on how the minimum age for adult models should be raised to 21. I wrote the article for sake of argument more that anything, but I received my fair share of lambasting for it (currently, however, I feel the minimum age for adult models should be 18). I also wrote a few articles on (now convicted) pedophile Gary Smith including interviews with a few of his victims. I got a lot of email for months after those pieces were published from people sharing their personal situations or thanking me for shedding light. Several people even asked me for updates on the situation as late as over a year after those articles were archived.

LAJ: You’ve written much more than I have over the years, which of YOUR editorials got the strongest response?

CY: Oh man, I always get a big response on the political editorials. I am of course pretty liberal by today’s standards, and that doesn’t always sit well with the more conservative-minded readers. But one article that I wrote really sticks out. It was a few years ago and I wrote an article that I titled “How to Pick Up Chicks at Internext.” The point, however, was that just because a woman works in the adult entertainment business doesn’t mean that she is eager to be hit on by every guy who attends the show. Apparently some readers never got past the title and therefore didn’t get to the point of the piece. That resulted in some nice heated hate emails, mostly from the very women I was trying to help. It was pretty funny, actually.

CY: I remember that two-part interview you did with Berman from Acacia shortly after they started to send out “packets” to adult webmasters demanding payments for streaming media on websites. Did you set that interview up, or did Berman contact YNOT?

LAJ: I had help from an undisclosed source who gave me Berman’s contact info well before the whole situation with Acacia became a huge issue in the industry. I contacted Berman on the phone, pitched him on the idea of the interview for YNOT News and managed to get two separate exclusive interviews out of it. I believe that AVN broke the Acacia story but YNOT News was the first adult online publication to secure and publish the first Berman interviews. Other publications then followed suit, not surprisingly.

CY: Who were some of your favorite writers to work with?

LAJ: Well, I worked with literally as many as 200 different writers at one time or another during my two years as Editor-in-Chief, and it really boiled down to two kinds of writers that were always a pleasure to work with… those who were top quality writers who put together fantastic articles both in content and style and therefore not needing any edits (or very few) from me, and those who were cognizant of deadlines and required little or no follow-up or reminders on my part. When you are dealing with deadlines, late and sloppy writing is a nightmare. So getting regular and excellent writers who get their polished submissions in on time and require minimal edits and HTML formatting are a goldmine. Quentin, Cyndalie and you, Connor topped the list in every category.

CY: Thanks for that, I appreciate the compliment. Did you ever receive an article submission that made you say, “What the hell was this guy thinking submitting this?”

LAJ: Plenty of times, although it definitely wasn’t the norm. It wasn’t so much the articles with the crazy or illogical ideas that bothered me either or made me wonder what the writer was thinking… I would more often than not choose to run those, because I liked to present as many viewpoints as possible (but would draw the line on inaccurate or deceiving information). I would also get the occasional 300 word “article” which was often times a poorly written press release and sometimes I’d get an article so full of grammatical errors that it required more edits than the existing text on the page. Basically I’d simply get “articles” from time to time that completely ignored the guidelines I had set on YNOT, and I did have pretty high standards. Spam articles, articles that didn’t meet my guidelines through both quantity and quality, and articles that ran on other resource sites before being submitted to me, I almost always passed on.

LAJ: You’ve been the EIC for The Adult Webmaster for a very long time… what kind of tidbits have you received that stick out in your mind?

CY: The one I remember the most came from a professional psychologist who was trying to get the adult industry to advertise his “porn addiction” services. He wrote this long article basically arguing that the porn industry should put up links to his “porn addiction help” website in the same way casinos put stickers on ATMs and such for “gambling addiction” hotlines. I published his article, but followed it up the next day with a rebuttal because I thought he was self-serving, opportunistic and pushing some dangerous and flawed ideas about adult entertainment. Well, years later we’re stuck listening to people like Senator Brownback talk about “porn addiction” as a reason for enforcing obscenity laws against adult entertainment companies and as a possible way for conservative censors to get around First Amendment protections. I was definitely right that guys like this psychologist were dangerous. I’d like to see more people from this industry watch out for the industry in general and beat back the lies that are spread about us and about erotic entertainment in general. This is our industry and our way of life, and we need to defend it.

CY: Over the past few years there have been a number of staff changes here at YNOT, especially following the acquisition of TheAdultWebmaster.com and, before that, the ownership change when Flying Croc stepped out of the picture. Two questions here. First, do you miss some of the people who you worked with at YNOT in the past?

LAJ: Sure I do. It’s always sad to see people come and go, especially those that leave the YNOT “family” altogether, so I miss Chris, Tad and Joanne. There are just a couple former YNOT employees that I still keep in touch with. Everybody’s personality here is so much of what makes YNOT what it is. I am happy to say that in the grand scheme of things and during my nearly five years here, the turnover rate at YNOT is very low. Not only for this industry but for companies in general.

CY: Second, how does it feel to be the “face of YNOT” alongside YNOTBob?

LAJ: I’ll give you one guess on that one. Of course it feels great. I think Bob will forever be the “face of YNOT” but fortunately because so many people in the industry know either Bob or myself or both of us, that perhaps by default after nearly five years of maintaining a public appearance that people associate me with the “face” of the company as well. If people do in fact perceive me that way, I am flattered beyond belief. Being associated with YNOT as well as being associated with YNOTBob in particular is a HUGE honor. In my opinion being the face of YNOT carries with it the notion that you are beyond being a good guy in this business. It means that you are ethical, hardworking, accessible, well known, fun-loving, a gentleman, and a little crazy at times!

CY: What’s something about your current YNOT duties that most people don’t know about?

LAJ: Hmm… that’s a tough one. Occasionally people will contact someone here when they really need me and vice versa. I still even get contacted for YNOT News stories even though I haven’t been the EIC in over a year. The bottom line is, if people need to contact someone here about anything relating to our chat boards, their webmaster account, Cybernet Expo, the YP events, media requests, advertising on The Adult Webmaster or anything marketing related, they should be contacting me. I don’t do tech!

CY: Your thoughts on the addition of SexyScribe to the YNOT writing team?

LAJ: I think it’s fantastic. Aside from the fact that she has excellent writing skills and gets along so well with everyone here, having her aboard enables us to have more news, articles, reviews and editorials published. I try to be on my best behavior around her (not really), but she is without doubt one of us.

LAJ: What are your thoughts Connor? It definitely requires you to rely on freelance writers a lot less…

CY: Yeah, I definitely like it better when I can rely on a trusted member of the YNOT team over policing freelance writers who may or may not get an article in by deadline. Having worked with a lot of writers over the last five years, I recognized Cynthia as a special talent right away. Writers of her caliber don’t grow on trees, and when you find one, you thank your lucky stars. And, I’m looking forward to the day I finally get her completely crazy drunk because I think underneath that calm Canadian exterior lays the heart of a party animal that would put most of us to shame! I think I’ll be able to prove that before the year is out. But don’t tell her what I’m up to.

CY: So I trust we’ll still get the occasional LAJ editorial on the new YNOT site? You of course know you have an open invitation any time you feel he urge to write again.

LAJ: Yup. And I’ll be blogging too.