Abbywinters.com Closing up shop?

[FTVGirls_Rob]

Wondering if there's any members of abbywinters on this board -- I know they had some trouble with Australian authorities in the past -- (archaic anti-porn laws) -- wondering if things are going sour over there.

I get monthly affiliate checks (we cross-promote each other, rebills) -- and while cashing the latest check a week ago, the account has been shut down (hence the check bounced). There's been a lot of affiliates of other sites that have closed up shop and bounced checks, but Abby is too big to close??

[dxhound2003]

I'm a member, have been for a long time. I got no inkling from the site and their boards about closing down. However some time ago they were raided and the boss Garion Hall is due in court. The headline mentions child pornography but it is nothing to do with that.

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/alleged-child-pornography-and-objectionable-films-seized-from-sex-site-boss-garion-hall/story-e6frf7kx-1225814347526

[Natal]

Heh...that guy looks pretty sleazy.

[Dilbert49]

I'm a member there as well and have seen no inkling that there is any trouble, although I don't generally see much "news" concerning porn sites other than what I might see on here.

[babyface]

Not sure this answers your question or not about this site but did find this, this morning.

http://www.xbiz.com/news/116055

[grande351]

Aussies, or at least their government must be total prudes! I've seen some material from AbbyWinters and it's pretty tame compared with some of the stuff out there. Some of the girls look very young, but if their ages check out as being over 18, there shouldn't be any problems.
It sounds to me like it's just a couple of girls who either had second thoughts afterward, or maybe their parents found out, and now they're claiming they were duped or lured in by offers of cash.

[Needle]

Some of the girls look very young, but if their ages check out as being over 18, there shouldn't be any problems.
Apparently, making a profit with "objectionable" material is illegal in some parts of the uncivilized wilderness of Australia. I wonder if it's punishable by booting.

[grande351]

Apparently, making a profit with "objectionable" material is illegal in some parts of the uncivilized wilderness of Australia. I wonder if it's punishable by booting.

Well, I'm not sure what "booting" is mate, but it doesn't sound like it would be a very g'day! :D
Maybe they'll tar and feather him, or smear Vegemite all over his body.

[Cayal]

Aussies, or at least their government must be total prudes!

Just the flipping government. To make matters worse, along with the bible bashing PM, we now have an even more religious opposition leader, Tony Abbott. He's earned himself the nickname "The Mad Monk" due to his religious fanaticism.

Logic please help Australia emerge from these dark times.!

[Natal]

Apparently, making a profit with "objectionable" material is illegal in some parts of the uncivilized wilderness of Australia. I wonder if it's punishable by booting.

I was under the impression that it was OK to sell it, you just couldn't make it, which is sort of wierd (to me anyway).

[dxhound2003]

Rob

I hope you don't mind but I e mailed them about what you said and this is their reply.

Hiya

Uh oh, that's how wild rumours start. I don't know what the misunderstanding
with his payment is, but we'll sort that for him, certainly. In the meantime,
we're going strong here. We haven't, and aren't about to close down.

Team Abby

[FTVGirls_Rob]

good to know then, I'll have chris contact them.

'foreign item returned due to account closed' GMBill -HSBC bank of Australia

on 3 checks from a one-month period.

[dxhound2003]

Rob

Maybe you could let us know how this works out.

BTW it looks like not all Australian politicians are opposed to porn if this story is to be believed.

http://www.scoop.co.nz/multimedia/tv/world/31100.html

[lordoth]

Hmm, wow. Didn't know the Abby CEO was from Melbourne (in Heidelberg as well, only 30min from me!)

Ha, and regarding the PM Rudd porn fiasco. I wouldn't surprised if he did follow a porn star but being the Prime Minister of Australia now, I don't think he'd be that stupid. Probably one of his staff did it.

[Nakolo]

Good riddance. I was actually became a member a year or so ago. 1/2 of the girls are dogs, the others are twice the age they claim. YUCK.

FTV has been my favorite site for years, until they started the hardcore stuff. Double YUCK. I'd actually rather look at some mutt chick, then some guy's rancid penis.

[dxhound2003]

Dont agree with you about AW or FTV. Anyway if you read all of this thread you can see AW is not closing.

[dxhound2003]

This is from the Abbywinters forum 1st June. They are not closing but have to move out of Aurtralia.

big changes at abbywinters.com
You may have heard that in June last year the police received a tip that G Media (parent company of abbywinters.com) were producing and selling DVD's in Victoria, that were not rated by the Classification Board. In late December 2009, I was charged by the Police for doing this. The charges against me were dropped, and two charges brought against the Company. On May 28th this year, I went to court, where the magistrate dealt with our case.

We have always believed the law to be grey in this area, and the law had not been properly tested in this regard. We could have spent many thousands of dollars in attempting to define the laws but this would have involved additional time and resources that the company could ill-afford, therefore, the Company plead guilty to the two charges.

Our QC (defense attorney) made submissions about the nature of our business, that we are reputable, well managed, have excellent systems and protocols in place, and have been operating openly since our inception, 10 years ago. The magistrate accepted all the submissions made to her by our QC.

The magistrate fined the company AU$6,000. Because of the way the law could be interpreted in Victoria, the company had no practical option but to proceed the way it did.

abbywinters.com cannot continue operating in Victoria any more. The work we have done to date has been identified by the courts, and the company has been penalised, so that appears to be the end of the matter. Laws in the Australian Capital Territory are more clear, but not entirely so.

For this reason, we have decided to relocate abbywinters.com to Amsterdam, the Netherlands! We have now stopped all potentially offending shoots in Australia, and expect to be closing our doors in Australia for good in late June. Some of our staff (including Chloe B, Patience and Jacki) are planning to come with us.

Australian legislators seem to be becoming more conservative - the internet filtering bill (expected to be passed in early 2011), for example. The changes in legislation, contribute to our decision, but also Europe presents many more opportunities to grow and develop our business, and it represents a huge and interesting challenge for me personally, and our staff.

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank all the staff and models we have worked with over the last 10 years. You have made the site fantastic. Please stay in touch.

[mancocapac]

So abbywinters.com will be getting a lot more Eastern European mob-supplied models?

[grande351]

So abbywinters.com will be getting a lot more Eastern European mob-supplied models?

True, but they'll probably be a lot hotter than the girls on there now!

[Natal]

True, but they'll probably be a lot hotter than the girls on there now!

Lol.....being hotter than the girls they have on now unfortunately isn't a very high bar to pass. If their current models are representative of Australian women in general I'd have to say they make them pretty rough down there.

[lordoth]

Hmm, being an Australian and living in Victoria myself... I can definitely say say we have lots of attractive women here. The girls are not 'rough' here at all. AbbyWinters is not a true indication of our general public of females. I would just say that Australia has less girls willing to get naked in front of a camera, and there is not much of an adult industry here.

It's very rare to here an Aussie accent naked on camera, which is probably why I liked Chloe so much.

[TheDoctor]

Abbywinters.com closing up for good in Australia due to some petty "interpretations" of the laws. If that does not read like Premium-level "nightmare fuel" (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HighOctaneNightmareFuel) for The Rob and every other people in adult entertainment, I don't know what does...

[wetteens]

Having been to Australia a few times I can say that Abby winters doesn't represent the quality of aussie girls. There are plenty of hot sexy Australian babes there. Just none of them are on Abby winters

[mart]

What was it with AbbyWinter girls!, i never actually came across any that i would think as being really beautiful, just average looking girls, in my opinion.

[Dilbert49]

There are some incredible beautiful women on AW! Also, I know this sounds cliche but it is true that AW shows the "beautiful" that is in all women - not just the model-type.

[mart]

There are some incredible beautiful women on AW! Also, I know this sounds cliche but it is true that AW shows the "beautiful" that is in all women - not just the model-type.

Well a friend quite a while back gave me his password (naughty i know but i only used it once lol.) to check it out and i really couldn't see any girls i liked enough to download, i'm not saying any of them were ugly or anything like that!. Maybe i'm just too fussy when it comes to girls i like to watch.

[TypeS]

There are some incredible beautiful women on AW! Also, I know this sounds cliche but it is true that AW shows the "beautiful" that is in all women - not just the model-type.

If I'm paying for a site, I want it to at least have some standards. I think they'll almost take anyone who will get nude in front of a camera, and quite honestly some of these girls should not be nude in front of a camera. I don't consider myself to have high standards, but I wouldn't even give some of these girls a passing glance on the street, so why would I want to see them naked?

[Dilbert49]

If I'm paying for a site, I want it to at least have some standards. I think they'll almost take anyone who will get nude in front of a camera, and quite honestly some of these girls should not be nude in front of a camera. I don't consider myself to have high standards, but I wouldn't even give some of these girls a passing glance on the street, so why would I want to see them naked?

That's exactly the point. We pay to join the sites that have some appeal to us and we bypass those which do not. While not every woman on AW (or any site, for that matter) "did it" for me, the concept in general did. On the other hand, there are many other sites which I would never join, despite how attractive the women are, because the concept doesn't work for me - sites where they're all covered in oil, for example.

[TheDoctor]

Where has this thread's topic gone? Amsterdam?

[Markrain10]

Glad to see I'm not the only one to find Abbywinters models to be pretty pathetic overall. I remember joining the site once on a whim and then regretting it. I bet 30% or less of the models I even found slightly attractive. Probably more like 20%. Surprised it's survived.

[TypeS]

To each his own, I guess. There are websites for the most bizarre stuff out there, so with that being the case it's not too surprising that there are some people who are just into plain, average looking girls.