The amateur porn site Is Anyone Up had been around for a number of years before big media caught word of it. Focusing mainly on ‘revenge porn’, the site, based in America, featured copious amounts of user submitted naked images. The proprietor, Hunter Moore, encouraged people to submit photos of themselves, or of previous lovers. Herein lies the rub, as most people would not condone the public communication of images they sent their ex-partners out of trust and love. However, a loophole in the law that protects Google, YouTube and Facebook also protects Is Anyone Up, stating that websites cannot be held responsible for content submitted by users.
What started as a small community built mainly around the alternative scene soon went global and Moore, who refused to remove images no matter how much pressure was placed on him, became the target of countless Cease and Desists, including one issued by Facebook. He was brought face to face with his victims on The Anderson Cooper Show and was even stabbed by someone he posted on the site. After years of legal issues and hundreds of images of underage people, and things of that nature, Moore called it quits, teaming up with Bullyville, an anti-bullying online company. However, recently the Is Anyone Up wheels have begun to spin and Moore is back, to the detriment of many all over the world.
I caught up with Hunter (who has been labelled The Most Hated Man On The Internet, as well as many other things I would deem inappropriate for publication) to understand the man who has essentially ruined so many lives. “I always thought Australian’s hated me, after the Sydney Morning Herald labelled me Hunter The Horrible. How awesome is that? I actually used to live in Australia – for two-and-a-half years. The scene there is fucked though, that’s one of the only things I didn’t like about it.”
Australia is actually where the story begins, explains Moore: “Well, I came to Australia first when I got a lot of money from a sexual assault claim; I was basically raped at my job. I never had any money, so I moved to Australia. I did the whole world travel thing for a year. I’d meet people on MySpace and just meet them all over the world. I remember being in Dubai doing drugs with Princes; it was nuts… When I moved back to the states, I literally had no money, I spent $300,000 in like 3 years. I had negative $120 in my bank account. I had to do terrible things to pay my phone bill. So I was always known amongst my circle for getting naked pictures of girls. My laptop had just been stolen; I was basically in the lowest part of my life. I started Is Anyone Up as a nightlife kinda thing, but I’d run out of money. At the time I was fucking this chick who was engaged to this really famous band guy, Beau Bokan from Blessthefall. She was fucking fine. Everyone wanted to see her naked and my friends were like ‘why don’t you put photos of her on Is Anyone Up?’, which I did and we got like 14,000 unique browser hits straight away! I realised I could make money off this, so I got real fucked up one night and took IAU to the next level.”
The site had a strong presence in the underground and was supported by advertising, though it wasn’t until he was invited to appear on The Anderson Cooper Show to explain himself to two female victims of the site that it went mainstream. “I wish I never did that interview. They lied to me and said it would be a one-on-one interview, but it was actually an ambush. I actually ended up fucking one of those girls like literally an hour after the show. Anyways, so yeah, Anderson Cooper is built for middle American mums who rally up and hate shit. They wanted me to be the villain and they succeeded in doing that, but with the site, we went from 100,000 – 140,000 unique hits a day to 450,000 a day. My server bill went from $8,000 a month to $12,000 a month within a matter of minutes of the show airing. The way it ruined my site though is that it brought too much attention. Before it was much more of a community, everyone knew everyone who was posted, it was all fun. People enjoyed it, but Anderson Cooper brought all the fucking creeps, that was when we started dealing with all the child porn and people fucking animals, death pictures…”, the result of which ultimately led to the site being shut down.
Until recently. A Tumblr account was set up to host the images and the Twitter account has been rife with submissions, with Moore continuing to offer free Tshirts to all those who send pictures. I pushed to see why he wants to start this all over again. “Its really hard for me to explain, as far as Is Anyone Up goes, I really changed the game in terms of amateur porn. But that’s boring as fuck now. There’s a million sites trying to be like mine was. My goal now is social networking, bringing social networking back because Facebook fucked the internet. I just want to get everyone’s dick sucked – That’s my goal. I can’t give away too much, but it’s going to be fucking insane.” Though he’s not worried about the same underage images or illegal submissions, he continues: “Is Anyone Up was porn, well, not in my opinion. I’m going to be walking the line pretty hard with this new site, it’s going to be totally different, similar but social networking to the fucking max.” Moore will continue to work with Bullyville, however, aiming at helping kids aged between 12-13 who are the victims of bullying at school and online. “That’s literally the hardest part of life for these kids”, he states, “but just kids, as soon as they’re over 18, I really don’t give a fuck”
I asked Moore what he thought of the dubious title of The Most Hated Man On The Internet: “I think that’s fucking awesome, I mean, that’s a hard title to get! There’s a lot of fucked up shit out there. My site actually had guidelines, rules, you’d get in trouble for posting horrible content.” Moore explained that he would notify the police as soon as underage people were submitted, resulting in dozens of arrests. “I love that title; I’m trying to be more neutral now.” The next question I asked was surely on the mind of many people who know of the site: what would you do if you had a daughter and she got posted? “Well, if she was underage I’d go through the whole legal process, I’d never give my children a camera phone…knowing how fucking horny I was at like 13…that shit is dangerous as fuck. I feel like Apple should put some cloud service where if your child sends a photo, it gets sent to you so you have to approve it, but as soon as they’re 18 dude, I don’t give a fuck. It’s all on them you know, how else are they going to learn from their mistakes?.”
Moore has now started working on something big, hinting at a potential IAU party involving adult entertainment giants Brazzers, as well as continuing the Is Anyone Up club parties, which sees him travelling the States to make appearances. He kept his lips sealed on other projects that he believes will see him “taking over the whole fucking world”. One thing is for sure, the character of Hunter Moore is not smoke and mirrors; the dude not only loves what he does but believes in it: a deadly mix for the groups, lawyers, companies (of which there are many!) up in arms to put an end to this.
