Siri Dahl is an AVN Nominated and multiple award-winning adult film star who has appeared in more than 200 adult films since 2012, and has been featured in publications such as The Atlantic, The New York Times and The Daily Beast. Originally known as just "Siri," she took a five-year hiatus in 2015, before happily returning to her adult film career in 2020. Siri is also a powerlifter, Twitch streamer, podcast host, and proud mom to two very spoiled black cats. She splits her time between Louisville and Los Angeles. Enjoy!

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***CORONA VIRUS EDITION***

In this episode Peter & Siri Dahl discuss:

1:41  -  Intro and welcome Siri 

3:32  -  Where you grew up?  When did you get into the industry and how did all that happen?

4:50  -  On what prompted your 5-year hiatus

7:45 -  On the increase in numbers of people being on Only Fan sites, and showing their own content.  Do you think it has democratized adult content in any way?  

9:25  -   On your income being 75 to 80% sourced by Only Fans.  Is that still accurate?

11:45  -  On legitimation of the adult entertainment industry

13:19 -  On any concerns of buyout versus traditional earning forms   

15:40  -  How did you get into NFT’s and what else are you looking at in terms of next steps 

17:00  -  On NFT’s (what they are, etc)

20:04  -  On back-up plans of how to reach your fans – another avenue besides social media, to get in touch with them

21:20  -  On what makes you the happiest in life?

23:00  -  On running your own business and staying on track

23:50  -  How can people find you?  Check out her After Adult Podcast here! Website: www.SiriDahl.com Socials:  @therealsirips on Twitter  @therealsiri.ps on INSTA  and SiriDahl on Twitch

24:06  -  Thank you Siri Dahl! And thank YOU for subscribing, reviewing and listening. Your reviews are working! Even if you’ve reviewed us before, would you please write even a short one for this episode? Each review that you post helps to ensure that word will continue to spread, and that we will all be able to reach & help more people! You can always reach me via peter@shankman.com or @petershankman on all of the socials. You can also find us at @FasterThanNormal on all of the socials. As always, leave us a comment below and please drop us a review on iTunes and of course, subscribe to the podcast if you haven’t already! As you know, the more reviews we get, the more people we can reach. Help us to show the world that ADHD is a gift, not a curse! Do you know of anyone you think should be on the FTN podcast? Shoot us a note, we’d love to hear!

25:12  -  Faster Than Normal Podcast info & credits

 

TRANSCRIPT: 

Hi guys. My name is Peter Shankman. I'm the host of Faster Than Normal, I want to thank you for listening, and I also want to tell you that if you've listened to this one, you probably listened to other episodes as well. If that's the normal, we are the number one ADHD podcast on the internet. And if you like us, you can sponsor an episode.  Head over to shank.mn/sponsor  - that's shank.mn/sponsor. It is alot cheaper than you think. You'll reach... God about 25….30,000 people in an episode and get your name out there, get your brand out there, your company out there, or just say, thanks for all the interviews we brought you over 230 interviews of CEOs, celebrities, musicians, all kinds of rock stars all around the world from we've had... who have we had...we've had Tony Robbins, Seth Goden, Keith Krach from DocuSign, we've had Rachel Cotton. We've had  Shinedown, right? Tons and tons of interviews, and we keep bringing in new ones every week. So head over to shank.mn/sponsor.  Grab an episode, make it yours, we'd love to have you. Thanks for listening.  Here's this week's episode, hope you enjoy it. 

You're listening to the Faster Than Normal podcast where we know that having ADD or ADHD is a gift, not a curse. Each week we interview people from all around the globe from every walk of life, in every profession. From rock stars to CEOs, from teachers to politicians who have learned how to unlock the gifts of their ADD and ADHD diagnosis and use it to their personal and professional advantage.  To build businesses, to become millionaires, or to simply better their lives. And now here's the host of the Faster Than Normal podcast, the man who usually can be found singing in the gym at 5:15 AM Peter Shankman. 

Hey guys, Peter Shankman here, welcome to another episode of Faster Than Normal. This one is going to be a little different.  What I have found in my life of having ADHD, and then in the past five or six years of talking to hundreds of people who are neurodiverse, is that among other things, we are incredibly passionate. We are incredibly passionate about what we do. We are incredibly passionate about how we do it, and goddamnit, we are not going to stop until every single person around us knows why we're passionate about what we do and how we do it. So every once in a while, we bring someone on the podcast who is not ADHD or ADD or neuro-diverse, but all, but who is passionate in some way or another. And I find fascinating, so I am thrilled that today's one of those episodes. I want you to meet Siri Dahl. Siri is an AVN, and if you don't know what that is, that's adult video news...  is an adult video news nominated and multiple award-winning adult film star, who has appeared in more than 200 adult films since 2012, and has,  get this... has been featured in such publications as  The Atlantic, the The New York Times  and The Daily Beast. I came across her when I was reading The Daily Beast, one of the, one of the like five or six things I have a paid subscription to… get a paid subscription to, The Daily Beast their content is really good, and I was reading. I'm like, I happen to know her PR person. I reached out to her PR person, and I'm like, dude, you, you, you did a great job ghostwriting. And he's like, no, she wrote this. I'm like, damn, she's good. So she was originally known just as Siri. She did a five-year hiatus in 2015 before happily returning to her adult film career in 2020, get this she's a powerlifter.  She’s a power lifter.  She is a Twitch streamer, podcaster host, podcast host, and proud mom of two very spoiled black cats.  She splits her time between Louisville and we all know my thoughts on Louisville, thanks to the 2014 Ironman…. and LA. Siri., welcome to Faster Than Normal, it’s great to have you.  

Thank you for having me.  

Awesome, so I want to get into sort of the things you do and how you do them, but let's start with your backstory.  Tell us where'd you grow up? How'd you grow up? When did, when did you get into the industry? Tell us in, you know, your 20 words or less bio, how'd that happen? 

So I'm originally from Minnesota,  was born in Minnesota, lived there about half my life. Uh, well it's no longer half cause I'm 32 now, but I lived in Minnesota till about middle school age, then moved to the suburbs of Ft. Worth, Texas and I lived there from basically until halfway through college. Uh, and then in 2012 is when I moved to LA, started working in the adult industry, and I was active in the adult industry, uh, from 2012 to 2015, then I retired and moved to Louisville, Kentucky, um, which I was very, uh, I hid that for a long time.  It was like, I don't want anyone to know I live in Louisville, but in the past like year I've been like, okay, I, I just say it. Well, cause I'm proud of it because it's a great city and I like it here despite what you think Peter.

It was a great city, until I was there at 104 degrees, racing in an Iron Man, you know, I'm drinking a bourbon…... and……. bats and yeah, but no, it was awesome until, until, until the 140 degree day.  All right, so you took a five-year hiatus.  What prompted that? 

Uh, well, actually it's funny cause you, or your podcasts, you talk about neurodiversity and while I... I've, I've never been diagnosed with ADD or ADHD. I've had a lot of people close to me in my life, some who have ADHD be like, yeah, you probably have. Who knows anyway. Uh, but I, I was, I've always been a depressed person. Like I've always dealt with like clinical depression. It's a thing that just runs in my family pretty, pretty strongly. Um, and it was kind of a combination of things in around 2014 and early 2015 that led me to retire, and probably the biggest one was that I was, uh, I used to be married. I was in a very bad, like, uh, just like a toxic relationship, that I needed to get away from, and due to the stigma of choosing a career in adult film, my relationship with my family was really rocky, and I basically didn't really talk to most of my even like immediate family members for about three years. Um, and I really needed to figure out a way to like, fix all that. So it got, it led me to a place where I was very depressed and the only way I saw that I could really try to make things better was to just kind of like, hit a reset button. 

Yep. 

So I left adult, I got divorced and I moved to a totally different state that I'd never even lived in before all at the same time 

So did you just literally like, throw a dart at a map and say, oh it landed on Louisville, let's go?

Uh, kind of, like I had some family here. 

 

And I know, I know it’s Louisville. Not, not, not Louisville. Um, all right. So let's, let's fast forward. So. The past 16 months of hell that we've all been in, um, has given birth to several new industries, and I would even argue, legitimize several new industries. Um, you know, I can tell I, I'm pretty sure that there are thousands of people around the country who, four years ago said, there's no way in hell I would ever own a Peloton. And here we are, um, you know, on the flip side, um, Only Fans and they say, they say that they say that to build a billion dollar business. It's, you know, 1% a good idea and 99% being in the right place at the right time, right? Only Fans was in the right place at the right time, and it didn't originally start with adult, but much like much like everything on the internet, you know, it, it, it sort of gravitated toward where's the, where the money was. I mean, hell, JPEGs and animated gifs started because of a dog. So, you know, sort of shockwave and almost everything you can pick up,  um, you have been a very vocal proponent of Only Fans, and, uh, people using it. Now you are granted, uh, one of the top, whatever percent, I'm sorry. I don't know your... your rank on Only Fans, but I know that there is, there is a, there is a, uh, I know a couple of other adult stars who are in the top...

It’s pretty high, I don't advertise my rank….

2 or  3% or whatever it is, um, and with that, there are, there are thousands of men and women on, uh, joining Only Fans and using Only Fans and, and, and showing content every single day. Do you think, I guess the first question I'd ask is, has it democratized adult content in any way?

Uh, yeah, a hundred percent like, and, and it's, I have such an interesting perspective on this, I think because of having been retired and, uh, you know, I'm not sure precisely when Only Fans kind of became a mainstream thing as far as like adult performers wanting to use it. Um, but I know that it was popular among adult performers before COVID, you know, it's just that because of the nature of what COVID has been like for everyone it's really exploded a lot in the last year. Um, but I, I, you know, it's been crazy for me having, like retired in 2015 and I just like walked away from the industry and I didn't really like have anything to do with anything else. Like, I was very much not in the public eye and then just kinda like springing back into it in 2020 and seeing, uh, how much things have changed, and a lot of it is because of Only Fans and there are similar platforms to Only Fans that have a hand in it as well. But like Only Fans is definitely the biggest one. Um, it has essentially put the power back into the hands of the content creators who are, you know, the, the performers themselves, as opposed to us relying on some giant studio to hire us, right?  Like... I, yeah, it Only Fans is the reason that I can live where I live and I don't really have to depend on going out to LA for work. Like I do go out there, but it's when I choose to, right? 

Yeah, exactly, you told the Rab?? 75 to 80% of your income is actually coming from Only Fans.  Is that still accurate? 

Yep. So yeah, it's, it's accurate. It's exciting, but it's also scary. 

I mean, you're putting a lot of eggs in one basket for lack of a better term. Now what's interesting about that is that a whole series of performers, um, have launched their career on Only Fans, and I guess they're kind of at a point where it's like, okay, what's the next step from there, right?  So, I mean, I'm not talking about, I'm even talking about the concept of, of legitimizing adult entertainment. You know, I, before, before porn was put unquote free on the internet, one of my first PR clients in 2003, it was a company called, um, New Frontier Media. Um, they….

I know, remember that's an older company…

There’s, you know, and they were based out of Boulder, and I remember, uh, getting them under the cover of, of, of Forbes magazine, you know, and it was this, it was this phenomenal. So I was, I would go to the Wall Street Journal and say, hey, I have this client who's kicking the crap out of their biggest competitor and you know, like an 80/20% margin, you should really talk to them. Oh, wow. That sounds amazing. What do they do? They're an adult entertainer. Wow. We can't, we can't do that. You know? And I'm like, but if it was furniture you'd have no problem with it, so I'm not really getting the hypocritical vibe here. And so, I…. do you think that Only Fans and things similar to that has sort of even more so legitimized adult entertainment as a, not only a viable, I mean, because look, let's face it, adult entertainment's been around forever. It's it's, it's how it's talked about versus how it's used is an entirely, you know, unrelated. I used to have great stats back when they back when New Frontier would, would sell to hotels, right? Exactly what percentage of hotels, uh, what percentage of, of, of revenue hotels were making for a dollar entertainment and it was literally was more than room service, it's crazy. Um, you know, back then. So, so I think it's in a way Only Fans legitimized adult entertainment in, in more than anything else ever has because everyone has the ability to do it. You don't have to go to LA,  you don't have to worry about being taken advantage of by a shady producer, none of that no longer exists. So tell, talk to me about that. Talk to me about the concept of, of legitimization. 

Uh, it absolutely has legitimized it in a lot of ways. Uh, I know that for example, you know, just the willingness of people to join and Only Fans, like back in 2012, if you like Google, like Siri, Siri, pornstar like, I mean, you're going to find a lot of adult stuff, but like I did a lot of writing for the website Quora back in like 2013, I was actually one of their best writers in 2013.  A lot of the stuff that I wrote had to do with like, anti-piracy like, and the concept of like paying for your porn and back then in 2013, 2014, like that was just, I mean, you know, this is like at the height of like PornHub and tube sites and PornHub back then had no monetization options for models, so there's been such a massive shift in the mentality of even just fans or people who follow adult performers, or like, honestly, just content creators in general, because you've got, you know, a website, like Only Fans where it's like, people can subscribe to me for like, just over $6 a month and that seems a lot more tolerable than the old model of joining a porn website, and it's 20, 30 bucks a month. And like, you feel like you're giving your credit card information away to some trading company, a lot of the time, right? So it's absolutely like, made it feel more mainstream, you know, nothing about, and Only Fans is clever about the way that they advertise, like on a corporate level, they do not actually advertise or own the fact that they are an adult related company. You know, if you ask them, they would say, we're for content creators, we don't specialize in porn, but like, we also know that most of the people on there are right. 

So does Tumbler….

Right. 

So that brings up an interesting question though. Um, do you get concerned about the fact that one day, Only Fans might say, you know what, now granted it's suicide for them to do that, right, but assuming there's a buyout or someone wants to own them and build something else and they just come out one day and say, you know what? No more adult. What happens to essentially an entire economic ecosystem?

Yeah, I think that that's not only likely, but it's probably inevitable that that would happen because it's happened, And it, it, honestly, it happens just about to all websites that become super large, that do, at some point accommodate adult performers. It's like, it will, it will flip over to where they don't welcome sex workers anymore, and that it's, terrifying to think about. I honestly, I just bought a house with mostly... with my Only Fans income, so I'm trying to not think about it. Cause it's, it's a scary thing to think about. Uh, but you know, I've got to do it. All the other people who survive off only pans have got to do, which is, come up with a contingency plan, right? Um, yeah, like most of my eggs are in that basket, but that's not really by choice.  That's just cause that's where the money is and that's where the fans want to be, so until something else comes along, that's even remotely comparable, that's kind of where all my businesses, that being said though, like, I'm very mindful about the fact that like, Ooh, okay, this is great right now, but it probably won't last because the adult industry sees this type of churn constantly with like, you know, the new website that is great while it lasts and then either via legislation or like outside attack, you know, something happens. And sometimes it is just the company itself being like, Oh, we sold now, now we're kicking you off. Like, that's what Tumbler did, you know? 

But you're looking so, so what's interesting about that is that you've sort of, I guess in a lot of ways, you're, you're looking at this long-term perspective, like you did just buy a house, um, and I read that you, you moved into an NFT. So you're looking towards the future. What do you see as the future of adult entertainment Um, with the assumption that something like Only Fans or whatever, cause, you know, look when, when Only Fans does... decide to do that, you know, that 97% of the people Only Fans haven't even talk about what they're having for lunch today, let alone that far into the future, right? Yeah. So it would seem that you're sort of putting together those contingency plans to begin with.  So how'd you get into NFTs and what else are you looking at in terms of next steps? 

Um, well, crypto in general, I'm glad you brought that up because crypto, I think is going to be a huge benefit for the adult industry, like there's been a push a lot in adult to, start integrating crypto more since 2013, but it still hasn't really like fully taken off. Um, but I think the biggest reason for us as an industry to go in a direction more toward crypto is just because we're, we’re very discriminated against by financial institutions and that's not going to end any time soon. You know, we already saw the MasterCard and Visa halt their payment processing for PornHub back in December, that's still not back, like we still don't have that capability, which is that's about $2,000 a month out of my pocket. As soon as they stopped doing that, yeah. And that's not even what I like depend on to live, but for a lot of people, it was.  So that was a huge blow, losing, uh, PornHub payments, and at any point, MasterCard and Visa could do the exact same thing with Only Fans. So if Only Fans goes down, it might not even be because they sell to another company. It could legitimately just be because MasterCard just., and it throws the hammer down on them.

You have you, I saw the NFT for those who don't know, then an NFT  is a fungible token. It's essentially, uh, you're creating a digital piece of artwork of any kind and someone owns you can purchase the right to that. If you all know the, the, the meme of the girl looking behind and smiling at the fire. She sold that original image, uh, the rights, that original image for half a million dollars, so not bad for a four year old at the time. Now she's 18, but, um, 

She's an adult now….

 ...that brings it, that brings up a secondary question. Um, right now, there is a lot, you know, look you have, you have, you have Elon Musk go on SNL and don't get me started on Musk, but you have him go on SNL, and he, he, he makes a joke about Doge and the, the, the, the, the crypto currency drops, you know, 40%, right?  And then you having him say the next day, oh, but it's OK, because we're going to, self-fund a satellite by a Doge and send that to, to space.. and it blows up again. I mean, I, I own Bitcoin. I started buying it at a hundred bucks a share. We had a hundred bucks going, granted. I sold it a thousand bucks a coin I've yet to get over that, and I'm fine. But, um, yeah, thanks. But, um, yeah, I'm not looking for your pity, but on the flip side of own, like going for years, I'm going to theory for a while. So, I mean, I believe in it, however, If we're still even just what I said, right. I bought it at a hundred bucks a year and sold a thousand bucks. I'm still comparing it to, in order to compare it to anything, you have to compare it to the dollar, right? You don't say that I bought a thousand dollars and it's worth 14, uh, camera lenses. Right? You, you, you don't compare the dollar to anything. You have to compare crypto still to the dollar and companies or countries, Wall Street… they don't, they're not huge fans of people deciding to create their own economies, riight? They lose understandably. Yeah. There is. There's been talk, I've talked to several people who work, who deal in a lot of crypto, like I do with my own coin and you know, we're like, well, what happens if the US decides to ban it? Do we leave, right?  I mean, it's a global economy, you can't say, but what happens is, you know, what happens if, if, if you start accepting, you know, let's say you have your own coin, uh, your own creator, coin, uh, Siri, or Dahl or whatever. and all of a sudden you have X hundred thousand dollars in it, and you're no longer allowed to take it out in the US right? So I think the issue is, I agree with you, the crypto is the future, but I think it's as scary if not more so than what you're dealing with. Only Fans right now, because. It's, you know, I understand why drug dealers deal only cash. Right? I get that now, you know, um, 

 

a trust issue, 

 

it is a hundred percent the trust issue, and, and if, if all of a sudden that goes away, right. Everything you've worked for is gone. Um, I always tell people who, you know, they build up these massive followings on Facebook and Twitter. And I go, guys, if you don't have these people's email addresses, Facebook or Twitter can easily one day say we don't like you and you've just lost everything you've worked for for 10 years. Right. So, so in terms of a backup plan, there, you have a ton of fans and Only Fans. Do you have a way to get to them? 

Um, Only Fans doesn't really provide us that, so, yup. That's another, it's like Only Fans is a great platform, but there are some serious downsides. One of them is lack of data, lack of insights into….I don't know, who's subscribing to me, you know, I don't get it. I don't, I get way less insights than any other social media platform. And it's, it's one of those things where it's like kind of silly that Only Fans does it that way, but they do it that way because it benefits them, but not the creators. So, uh, and, and yeah, um, like, I feel the same thing when it comes to, it's funny that you mentioned that like the, the fact that like at any moment, you know, if your account gets deleted on social media, like I have, you know, 570,000 Instagram followers. and if I get deleted, what, you know, now the closest thing I have is like, I have, uh, my, my main website, Siridahl.com, which is really just like a merch store, but like I have a mailing list that people can sign up through, through there, and then I also have my own discord server that I started as a way to like keep in touch with my Twitch subscribers, to let them know when my streams are coming up and stuff. But now I'm just allowing anyone to join it because it's a fantastic, like fail safe in case I lose access to any of these other channels.

What makes you that... let's completely switch topics here because I want to be respectful of time, we have about four minutes. What makes you the happiest? Um, other than your two cats, obviously.

Yeah, um, just like being able to create my own daily reality. It’s what makes me the happiest, it’s one of the reasons that I really love what I do for a job, it's like, you know, it's I, you, you read my Daily Beast piece, so you know what I say in there, but like, a lot of people look at someone who's in the adult industry and they think, oh, you just have sex on, on, in front of a camera and then you get paid, and it's like, that's literally, I like almost never do that. Like, like the last time I flew out to LA and was on a professional set, was over two months ago. The last time I actually filmed like a sex shoot on my own even was about a month and a half ago. Like I, most of what I do is. More akin to like, um, just general content creator stuff, or even like customer service, like, cause I, I respond to a lot of messages from fans on Only Fans. So a lot of the time I feel like I'm just, you know, being paid to just like shoot the shit with people, which is fantastic. And I love it, but I love being in control of my, what I do every day. What time I wake up, what time I go to bed? Like my own schedule. It's all under my control, I'm a business owner, that's great. 

That being said. And as the last question, what keeps you, from going off the rails like for instance, if I don't, I have to I'm in the same boat as you. I can go do whatever I want today, right. I could go sit on this couch and watch 14 episodes in a row King of the Hill. I probably shouldn't do that, right? So I have rules in place that allow me to be productive. You know, I get enough sleep, you know, I try to eat healthy. I,...I have to work out every morning, things like that. 23:00  --  What are your rules that keep you from, you know, when you do work for yourself and no one's telling you, Hey, you have to do this or that. What's keeping you on track. 

Um, well, powerlifting is the biggest one. Uh, for me that's been power lifting is the biggest one. I started seriously powerlifting, powerlifting in general, about five years ago, but I got really serious about it two years ago when I hired like, like a, a really good coach. Um, and so I've done a couple of competitions, but that's something that it's like my, my, my week, it feels totally off kilter. If I don't have access to a gym, if I can't actually go do a proper, like, you know, training schedule. Um, so that's honestly like the biggest thing. And other than that, like, I. I, uh, I definitely have a huge issue with like procrastination. So it's very easy for my life to go off the rails if I'm not being extremely careful, um, I just, I just set reminders. I have so many reminders of, I have to like remind myself to like literally do everything. I love to set a reminder to take a shower, otherwise I'll forget, so technology helps. 

I believe it. Well, listen, Siri, thank you so much. Uh, siridahl.comYep. Siri, Dahl.com 

 

And you’re on Instagram, you're everywhere, follow her guys, she is phenomenal. The stories she tells, the content she creates is, is over the top grade. And I'm a huge fan and I love, I want to see more of your writing. I hope that you will continue to write op-eds, they are so good and they are so powerful. The things that you're saying are just so needed to be said. So I think it's great. Uh, stick around after we say goodbye. Guys, my name is Peter Shankman, this is Faster Than Normal. I really appreciate you listening as always. And as I mentioned it to you earlier, or you probably heard earlier on the ad, there is a way for you to sponsor this episode. If you go to shank.mn/sponsor you can pay for an ad in cryptocurrency, and it's actually a lot easier than you think, so I encourage you guys to check that out. We will see you next week as always. Thank you for listening. I love you guys, ADHD and all forms of neuro-diversity are gifts, not curses, treat them as such, we'll talk to you soon. 

 

 

Credits: You've been listening to the Faster Than Normal podcast. We're available on iTunes, Stitcher and Google play and of course at www.FasterThanNormal.com I'm your host, Peter Shankman and you can find me at petershankman.com and @petershankman on all of the socials. If you like what you've heard, why not head over to your favorite podcast platform of choice and leave us a review, come more people who leave positive reviews, the more the podcast has shown, and the more people we can help understand that ADHD is a gift, not a curse. Opening and closing themes were composed and produced by byrom.squarespace.com/musix">Steven Byrom who also produces this podcast, and the opening introduction was recorded by Bernie Wagenblast. Thank you so much for listening. We'll see you next week.