Seth Warshavsky (born 1973) is an American pornographer and the founder of Internet Entertainment Group (IEG). During the

dot-com bubble The dot-com bubble (dot-com boom, tech bubble, or the Internet bubble) was a stock market bubble in the late 1990s, a period of massive growth in the use and adoption of the Internet. Between 1995 and its peak in March 2000, the Nasdaq Compo ...

, Warshavsky's welcome of media attention made him the face of the online pornography industry to a public fascinated with what was then virtually the only segment of the dot-com industry operating at a profit. On February 10, 1998, he testified at a hearing on Internet Indecency before the US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation. Beginning in 1996, with the profits from a

phone-sex Phone sex is a conversation between two or more people by means of the telephone which is sexually explicit and is intended to provoke sexual arousal in one or more participants. All parties participate voluntarily; it is typically accompanied b ...

operation he started while living in the Oregon building in Seattle, Washington, he had friends at AT&T who would find him sex-related numbers. Warshavsky converted a warehouse in

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...

into the studios of IEG's flagship website, Clublove.com. The website used computer technology that was cutting edge for its day. The business model was similar to that of a live

peep show A peep show or peepshow is a presentation of a live sex show or pornographic film which is viewed through a viewing slot. Several historical media provided voyeuristic entertainment through hidden erotic imagery. Before the development of the c ...

. For a monthly membership fee plus an hourly charge, customers could watch postcard-sized, low-resolution images of women strip and touch themselves in real time. For more money, they could talk to the

camgirl A webcam model (colloquially, camgirl, camboy, or cammodel) is a video performer who streams on the Internet with a live webcam broadcast. A webcam model often performs erotic acts online, such as stripping, masturbation, or sex acts in exchan ...

s over the phone and direct them. Warshavsky was featured on the front page of the ''

Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

'' in 1997. In 1999, Warshavsky was rated number 40 on

Time Magazine ''Time'' (stylized in all caps) is an American news magazine based in New York City. For nearly a century, it was published weekly, but starting in March 2020 it transitioned to every other week. It was first published in New York City on Ma ...

's list of 50 "most important figures in technology."

Early Internet pornography scandals

Warshavsky was involved in many of the early Internet's porn-related media controversies, including: * the distribution of a homemade pornographic video starring

Pamela Anderson Pamela Denise Anderson (born July 1, 1967) is a Canadian-American actress and model. She is best known for her glamour modeling work in ''Playboy'' magazine and for her appearances on the television series ''Baywatch'' (1992–1997). Anders ...

and

Tommy Lee Thomas Lee Bass (born October 3, 1962) is an American musician and founding member of the heavy metal band Mötley Crüe. As well as being the band's long-term drummer, Lee founded rap metal band Methods of Mayhem and has pursued solo musical ...

* a 1996 lawsuit over use of the domain name candyland. Hasbro v Internet Entertainment Group (Founded by Seth Warshavsky) 1996 WL 84853 * a 1998 lawsuit over a sex video of

and Bret Michaels (never aired by IEG) * a 1998 lawsuit by actor

Kelsey Grammer Allen Kelsey Grammer (born February 21, 1955) is an American actor and producer. He gained notoriety and acclaim for his role as psychiatrist Dr. Frasier Crane on the NBC sitcom ''Cheers'' (1984-1993) and its spin-off ''Frasier'' (1993-2004), ...

over another sex video (also never aired) * the Our First Time hoax. * nude photographs of

Laura Schlessinger Laura Catherine Schlessinger (born January 16, 1947) is an American talk radio host and author. ''The Dr. Laura Program'', heard weekdays for three hours on Sirius XM Radio, consists mainly of her responses to callers' requests for personal adv ...

in 1998 * Papalvisit.com, a website with information about the 1999 visit to the U.S. by

Pope John Paul II Pope John Paul II ( la, Ioannes Paulus II; it, Giovanni Paolo II; pl, Jan Paweł II; born Karol Józef Wojtyła ; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 1978 until his ...

that also featured salacious stories and links to pornographic websites * the investment and creation, with David Marshlack, of VoyeurDorm.Com

IEG collapse

At IEG's peak, Warshavsky claimed to have 100,000 subscribers and $100 million annual revenue, although subsequent events cast doubt on the veracity of this earnings claim. Anderson and Lee filed a $90 million copyright-infringement suit against IEG in 1998 to claim a share of the profits of the video of them. A U.S. district court judge dismissed the case, ruling that the duo gave up their rights when they agreed to let IEG webcast the footage. Following appeals, Anderson and Lee were awarded a $1.5 million judgment plus court costs and attorney fees in December 2002.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Warshavsky, Seth Living people Place of birth missing (living people) American people of Polish-Jewish descent American Internet celebrities 1973 births