A wonderful interview with Rich Moreland from 3hattergrindhouse. This was one of the first of many. It was released in 2015.

3. Some critics of female-centered porn are saying that often women directors make movies that use the traditional "male gaze." They insist there is no difference between how a woman or a man shoots when comes to sex. For example, Jacky St. James (JSJ) can make a romance film, then turn around and shoot a series of gonzo vignettes. The now-retired Bobbi Starr was big on shooting gonzo, but Candida Royalle would never think of doing it. What is your view on this? Has feminism been broadened so much as to lose its meaning?

I think that critique says more about the critics than it does the women making porn.

Clearly, such critics think there’s a "proper" way to make porn if you’re a woman, something with rules limiting and restricting what female porn directors do and how they do it. I’m not interested in telling other women what to do. I’m not interested in putting them in convenient little boxes, or in defining what makes a female director a “feminist.”

For that matter, why shouldn’t a woman be free to make both porn which she would define as ‘feminist’ and porn which she wouldn’t define that way? Does she owe some kind of creative debt to the world, such that she’s only allowed to make one kind of movie, from one kind of perspective? Would anybody try to put a male pornographer in the same kind of box? I doubt it.

4. My next book is on JSJ. How would you describe her films, particularly her features? What does she do to stand out in the business (if you believe she does)?

I absolutely love Jacky to death. She has been so hugely important to the Mindbrowse.com event series. She’s so eloquent and always does an amazing job as a panelist.

Jacky’s film work reflects her personality; she’s a very perceptive, highly creative woman with something to say. I think she’d be successful in making movies of any kind – but I’m glad she chose porn, because she’s one of the directors who is really helping to raise the bar on quality within the adult industry. I honestly don’t get to spend much time watching movies made by my peers, but when I do find the time, Jacky is on the very short list of directors whose work I make a point of watching.

5. Do you believe Fifty Shades of Grey – though it is a print product — is changing a woman's perception of filmed pornography? Is it opening up new avenues for women's sexuality (like BDSM) or is it merely a passing fad? Has it increased interest in Sssh? I know you and Colin started Wasteland.com. Has Fifty had an impact on wasteland? Has Kink.com, which has a history of feminist performers like Casey Calvert, Dylan Ryan, and Madison Young, influenced either Sssh or wasteland?

While I agree with a lot of critics and members of the BDSM community who think Fifty Shades is not a particularly realistic or authentic depiction of BDSM, there’s no doubt its popularity has shoved open the door to a much larger market and a lot more interest. Both Sssh and Wasteland have seen an increase in traffic we can directly attribute to the popularity of Fifty Shades, especially in the number of searches for BDSM and related terms.

I think it’s significant that the Fifty Shades craze was in response to a novel, just because that’s perceived as a “safer” and more traditional means for women to explore erotica. Consider this: Even though there’s a lot of data to the contrary, a lot of people still don’t believe women watch internet porn, but I haven’t heard anybody express one iota of doubt that it’s really women buying all those copies of Fifty Shades. Nobody questions whether women read erotica; the truth is we watch plenty of it, too – a truth I think people are finally becoming more open to now, in part due to the Fifty Shades craze.

I’d have to say neither Fifty Shades nor Kink.com has had an impact on Sssh or Wasteland, really. Both sites (Sssh & Wasteland) had already been around for so long before the book came out and before Kink launched that we were very much settled in our aesthetic, style and production methods by the time they became popular. We certainly respect the work done by Kink and the performers you mentioned, but our influences and inspirations come from other places and times.