cosmio

The stories money couldn't keep buried

[cosmio @cosssmio]

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[cosmio @cosssmio]

Paris Hilton was 19 when her boyfriend Rick Salomon filmed them having sex. He was 13 years older and kept pushing until she gave in. Two years later the tape leaked online, right before her show The Simple Life premiered on Fox. Then Salomon sold the full version to a porn studio. It opened with a dedication to the victims of 9/11. It became the best-selling porn title of the year. Paris says she never made a dollar from it. And later the same man married Pamela Anderson. Twice.

Paris met Rick Salomon at 18. He was a poker player in his thirties. In her 2023 memoir she writes that he kept asking to film them in bed. He told her that if she wouldn't do it, "he could easily find someone who would." "I got hammered, and I did it."

He shot it on a night-vision camera on a tripod. He promised it was just for them.

In 2003 Paris was in Australia when her manager called. A 37-second clip of her having sex was all over the internet. The Simple Life premiered days later to 13 million viewers.

In 2004 Salomon sold the full 45-minute tape to Red Light District Video. It came out on June 15 as "1 Night in Paris." The first frame read: "In memory of 9/11/01... We will never forget."

Paris sued for $30 million for invasion of privacy. The court threw the case out. In 2005 she settled for $400,000 plus a cut of sales and said she'd give it to charity. "I never received a dime from the video." Salomon reportedly made around $10 million from it.

At the 2005 AVN Awards "1 Night in Paris" won Best Selling Title of the Year and Best Renting Title of the Year.

Salomon married Shannen Doherty in 2002. The marriage lasted nine months. In 2007 he married Pamela Anderson, whose own sex tape had been stolen and sold a decade earlier. That marriage was annulled within months. In 2014 they married again. In the divorce he paid Pamela $1 million.

Paris Hilton never writes his name in her memoir. She calls him "Scum." In 2021 she said the tape is "something that will hurt me for the rest of my life."

He made millions off one night and married Pamela Anderson. She got a tape she can never erase.

Some lessons are written in other people's mistakes. Watch it once. Remember it forever.

[cosmio @cosssmio]

@defimaren is a pretty casual response to everything she just described.

[cosmio @cosssmio]

@SpikeNLB hahah, this is what happens when you don’t pay the electricians

[cosmio @cosssmio]

Pamela Anderson married Tommy Lee four days after they met. On their honeymoon they filmed themselves having sex. An electrician Tommy refused to pay stole their safe with the tape inside, the one with their sex on it. In 12 months the tape made $77 million. Pamela got absolutely nothing from it and never even watched it. Then Hollywood made a whole TV series about it without asking her.

New Year's Eve, 1994. She was the biggest star on Baywatch and the most famous Playboy cover girl in the world. And her boyfriend was the drummer of Mötley Cr��e. Six weeks later they ran into each other in Cancún. And four days later they got married on the beach. At her wedding she wore a bikini.

They filmed everything. Boats, beaches, bed. 54 minutes of a honeymoon.

Back in Malibu, Tommy was renovating the house. He fired an electrician named Rand Gauthier and kept his tools. Gauthier said he was owed $20,000.

So he came back at night and stole a 500-pound safe out of their garage. He was hoping for guns and jewelry. He found a videotape.

He took it to a porn producer. They cut it down to the sex. Then they sold it. In 1996 it hit the early internet, one of the first viral videos in history.

Pam and Tommy sued for years. In the end an internet porn company kept the right to stream it. The tape made $77 million in under a year.

"I blocked that stolen tape out of my life in order to survive."

Her career took the hit. His didn't. Late-night hosts asked her about it on air.

The marriage didn't survive either. In 1998 Tommy went to jail for spousal battery.

She says it was the only time she was ever truly in love.

Then the husbands. Kid Rock. Rick Salomon, the man who sold Paris Hilton's tape. Married, annulled, married again. A Hollywood producer: 12 days.

In 2022 Hulu released Pam & Tommy, a series about the worst thing that ever happened to her. Nobody asked her permission. She refused to watch it.

A year later she released her own memoir and her own documentary. No makeup. Her words.

Some lessons are written in other people's mistakes. Watch it once. Remember it forever.

[cosmio @cosssmio]

@defimeron Being supportive doesn't mean a parent has to be comfortable with every decision their child makes.

[cosmio @cosssmio]

Kim Kardashian was 22 when she filmed a sex tape with Ray J. Four years later a porn studio released it. She sued and walked away with $5 million. Months later her family's reality show premiered. Today she's a billionaire. Ray J says in court papers that Kim and her mother planned the release themselves. And in 2023 Kim quietly paid him $6 million to never talk about it again.

In the video below, Kim talks about the tape she says ruined her life and everyone else says made it.

She filmed it in 2003. She was Paris Hilton's friend and stylist. Nobody knew her name.

In February 2007, Vivid Entertainment put it out as "Kim Kardashian, Superstar." Kim sued to stop it. Two months later they settled. She got $5 million.

That October, Keeping Up with the Kardashians premiered.

For almost 20 years the story was simple: the tape leaked, she was the victim, she built an empire anyway.

In 2023, on the family's new show, they said Ray J had a laptop with more footage. Ray J says they accused him of assault and extortion. Soon after, Kim signed a secret deal: $6 million to Ray J, and no one mentions the tape on the show again.

Ray J says they broke it a month later.

In 2025 he went on a livestream and said Kim and Kris were facing a racketeering case. Kim and Kris sued him for defamation.

He sued back. His version: he, Kim and Kris all signed the deal with Vivid before the release. Kim wanted her mom to run it. The lawsuit against the porn studio was staged to create buzz.

Kim answered under oath: "a lie." Kris: "absolutely false."

In April 2026 a judge sent Ray J's case to private arbitration. That's how the world learned about the $6 million.

In August the judge let Kim and Kris's defamation case go forward. Ray J's lawyer called Kim's behavior "despicable" and promised an appeal. Ray J says the porn studio's CEO will testify for him.

One tape. $5 million from the studio. $6 million to keep him quiet. A billion-dollar family. And two people who were in the same bed telling two completely different stories.

Some lessons are written in other people's mistakes. Watch it once. Remember it forever.

[cosmio @cosssmio]

@racerhome 1.5 million subscribers before turning 12 is impressive, but I can't imagine how much pressure that put on a kid.

[cosmio @cosssmio]

Bonnie Blue slept with a university student. Then she slept with his father. Her own mother made the sign she used to recruit freshmen: "Bonk me and let me film it." She left her husband, then kept hiring him. One night in London she had 1,057 men in 12 hours, and one of them got dragged out of the queue by his mum. This year she had 400 more in a day, announced she was pregnant, and started filming with a fake bump.

In the video below, she explains exactly how she turned it into a business.

Her real name is Tia Billinger. A girl from Nottinghamshire who wanted to be a midwife. She spent five years recruiting staff for the NHS and 18 months trying to have a baby with her husband.

They married in 2022 and moved to Australia. She saw cam girls on TikTok and tried it herself. $5,000 the first week. Then escorting. Then OnlyFans.

Six months later she split from her husband. She kept hiring him anyway.

Spring break in Cancún: 122 students. Freshers' week in Derby and Nottingham: 150 more.

On a podcast she said she'd slept with students, their lecturers and married men. Then she told the story of the student and his father. The clip was deleted. Too late.

She said unsatisfied men have the right to cheat, and it makes them better husbands.

January 11, 2025. A mansion in London. Men in balaclavas lined up around the block. 1,057 in 12 hours. One of them got pulled out of the line by his mother.

Six months later she announced she'd be tied up naked in a glass box for 2,000 men. OnlyFans banned her for life. At that point she was making $2.1 million a month. Another OnlyFans star offered her $2 million just to stop. She didn't.

A Channel 4 documentary about her drew 2.1 million viewers. The most watched since Leaving Neverland.

She got punched in the face outside a club in Sheffield. She got arrested in Bali with 17 men and deported. Fine: £9. She dated a 19-year-old rapper who wrote a song about her.

The Telegraph called her family business a £34 million enterprise. And a feud.

In February 2026 she claimed unprotected sex with about 400 men in one day. Then she said she was pregnant. Then she started posting with a prosthetic bump.

Nobody knows who the father is. Nobody even knows if there's a baby.

Some lessons are written in other people's mistakes. Watch it once. Remember it forever.

[cosmio @cosssmio]

Stormy Daniels slept with Donald Trump. And got $130,000 from his lawyer for her silence. They slept together in a suite at Lake Tahoe. Meanwhile, his wife had given birth four months earlier. Then her own lawyer stole $300,000 from her. Then a judge ordered her to pay Trump.

In the video below, she sits down with Piers Morgan and tells the whole story, laughing at some parts and going cold at others.

It was a celebrity golf tournament in 2006. His bodyguard invited her to dinner. Trump met her in silk pajamas, and she spanked him with a rolled-up magazine with his face on the cover. He promised her a spot on The Apprentice. She never got it.

Five years later she agreed to sell the story to a magazine. A man walked up to her in a Las Vegas parking lot while she was holding her baby daughter. "Leave Trump alone. Forget the story." Then he looked at the baby. "That's a beautiful little girl. It'd be a shame if something happened to her mom."

She stayed quiet. In October 2016, 11 days before the election, Michael Cohen made it official, with a fake name in the contract.

In 2018 the Wall Street Journal broke the story. She hired a TV-famous lawyer, Michael Avenatti. He was on cable news every night. People talked about him running for president.

She sold a book for $800,000. Avenatti forged a letter with her signature and took nearly $300,000 of the advance. He got four years in prison.

He had also filed a defamation suit against Trump for her, against her wishes. She lost. The court ordered her to pay Trump's lawyers more than $600,000. She said she'd go to jail before paying a penny.

In 2024 she testified in a Manhattan courtroom with Trump sitting a few feet away. He was convicted on 34 felony counts. He denies the encounter ever happened and is appealing.

Six months later he won the White House again.

She still gets death threats and doesn't leave home without a bulletproof vest.

$130,000 to keep quiet. $300,000 stolen by the man who was supposed to protect her. $600,000 owed to the man she slept with.

Some lessons are written in other people's mistakes. Watch it once. Remember it forever.

[cosmio @cosssmio]

@0xNoryxx I used to think the Playboy Mansion was one endless party. Holly makes it sound like an awful place to live.

[cosmio @cosssmio]

Brittni De La Mora was one of the biggest names in porn when her boyfriend was stabbed to death in front of her by members of a motorcycle gang. She hid in a hotel while police searched for the killers. In that room she found a Bible and started copying out verses. She says the fear started to go away. It still wasn't enough to make her quit.

In the video below, she sits down with Allie Beth Stuckey and goes back to where it started. She says she was verbally abused as a kid and grew up starving for someone to tell her she was worth something.

When she was 18 and in college, she was dancing at a strip club in Santa Barbara to pay her way. One night producers walked up and asked if she wanted to make "romance movies."

She says she wanted out within the first month. But on set everyone told her she was beautiful, and it felt like a family. Pride kept her there for seven years. She made around 300 films. Maxim named her one of the 12 biggest stars in the industry.

To get through it she used her#in and c#caine. She took GHB just to fall asleep. She watched other performers die from suicide and overdoses. At one point she tried to kill herself.

After the murder, she went back to work anyway. Then one night she wrote in her journal: "Jesus, Buddha, God, whichever one of you is real, save me." In December 2012 she quit for good.

In 2016 she married a pastor who had stayed celibate for eight years. They waited until their wedding night.

Today she has two kids and runs a ministry that helps other women leave the industry. All 300 videos are still online.

She says God forgave her.

[cosmio @cosssmio]

Lana Rhoades worked in porn for just eight months and became the most searched woman on Pornhub. She was paid $1,200 a scene. She grew up near Chicago with a single mom and a seriously ill older sister, and she says nobody had time for her.

As a teenager she was using dr*gs with her boyfriend and helping him break into houses. At 16 she was sent to youth prison. She got her GED inside and was released after a year. She says it was one of the best things that ever happened to her.

In the video below, she sits down with NBA player Michael Porter Jr. on his podcast and explains what came next. At 17 she got a job at Hooters. “That was my first job where men sexualize you.” Then a strip club. Then porn, at 19.

She says she still looked like “a little kid,” and that’s exactly what sold.

Her first agent wouldn’t give her time off to see a doctor when her body started breaking down. The second kept pushing her into harder scenes. She had panic attacks before shoots.

On her own podcast she described the worst one. A man made her throw up into a bowl, urinated in it and told her to drink it. “I didn’t know how to say no.”

She quit after two four-month stints, with about $100,000 in the bank. Two years later her videos had 345 million views.

She says the industry left her suicidal. Today she has a son, goes by her real name, Amara Maple, and wants every one of those videos deleted. She says porn should be illegal.

The case against her: she says she wanted this since she was 14, she signed every contract, and she became a multi-millionaire off the fame porn gave her.

$1,200 a scene, and the videos will outlive her. Who really got paid?

[cosmio @cosssmio]

Lana Rhoades worked in porn for just eight months and became the most searched woman on Pornhub. She was paid $1,200 a scene. She grew up near Chicago with a single mom and a seriously ill older sister, and she says nobody had time for her.

As a teenager she was using dr*gs with her boyfriend and helping him break into houses. At 16 she was sent to youth prison. She got her GED inside and was released after a year. She says it was one of the best things that ever happened to her.

In the video below, she sits down with NBA player Michael Porter Jr. on his podcast and explains what came next. At 17 she got a job at Hooters. “That was my first job where men sexualize you.” Then a strip club. Then porn, at 19.

She says she still looked like ��a little kid,” and that’s exactly what sold.

Her first agent wouldn’t give her time off to see a doctor when her body started breaking down. The second kept pushing her into harder scenes. She had panic attacks before shoots.

On her own podcast she described the worst one. A man made her throw up into a bowl, urinated in it and told her to drink it. “I didn’t know how to say no.”

She quit after two four-month stints, with about $100,000 in the bank. Two years later her videos had 345 million views.

She says the industry left her suicidal. Today she has a son, goes by her real name, Amara Maple, and wants every one of those videos deleted. She says porn should be illegal.

The case against her: she says she wanted this since she was 14, she signed every contract, and she became a multi-millionaire off the fame porn gave her.

$1,200 a scene, and the videos will outlive her. Who really got paid?

[cosmio @cosssmio]

Annie Knight slept with 583 men in six hours and ended up in hospital. Last month she had a $180,000 wedding, and the MC thanked “the 30,000 sad, lonely men that paid for all this.” She used to be a shopping centre marketing manager on $60,000 a year.

In the video below, she sits down with 60 Minutes Australia and explains how it happened. She says she was depressed in her marketing job. Then she saw how much one OnlyF*ns creator was making, and “this spark ignited in me.”

She started in 2020 to save for a house. On day five of a new job she got an email: termination of contract. So she went full-time. $5,000 a month became $30,000, then six figures.

In May 2025 she did 583 men at a Gold Coast sex club. Two days later she was in hospital, bleeding. Her income tripled. She tells 60 Minutes she now makes $450,000 a month.

She says she used to tell her friends she’d never find love. Then her best friend of ten years, Henry Brayshaw, proposed.

She later confirmed she’d been kissing an American podcaster in LA with Henry at the same table. 72 hours later they were engaged.

Several of her closest friends refused to be bridesmaids. Their bosses didn’t want them seen next to her.

Henry’s father, retired cricketer James Brayshaw, didn’t come to the wedding.

The case for Annie: she hides nothing, her husband calls it just a job, and she makes more in a month than her old salary paid in seven years.

$450,000 a month, and your best friends can’t stand next to you at your own wedding. Worth it?

[cosmio @cosssmio]

@OneTweetAwayMan Back then, she clearly viewed the situation differently.

[cosmio @cosssmio]

Miriam Weeks paid her $60,000-a-year Duke tuition by shooting porn. Then a classmate recognized her. She was 18. On school breaks she flew to LA and filmed scenes as “Belle Knox” for about $1,300 each.

In January 2014 a classmate spotted her in a video and told his frat. Within days the whole campus knew. People online demanded Duke expel her. Some wrote that she should be raped.

She went on CNN. In the video below she tells Piers Morgan: “I’m not being exploited, I love what I’m doing, and I’m safe.”

Critics claimed she had turned down a full scholarship to Vanderbilt and was already getting aid from Duke.

She graduated in 2016. Her former publicist says with zero debt.

Lifetime made a movie about her life. She says she got nothing for it.

By 2018 she was reportedly in law school under a different name. She no longer talks about Belle Knox.

A debt-free Duke degree, and the internet knows her real name forever. Worth it?

[cosmio @cosssmio]

For two years an old man was wheeled into a California courtroom slumped to one side, mouth hanging open, barely able to whisper “guilty.” On the day he was sentenced, prosecutors released the video from his jail cell:

His name is Joseph DeAngelo, the Golden State Killer. In the 1970s and 80s he killed 13 people and raped dozens of women across California, part of that time while working as a police officer. Nobody caught him until 2018, when investigators traced crime scene DNA through a genealogy website to his family tree.

After his arrest, left alone in an interrogation room, he started talking to himself about someone named Jerry: “I didn’t have the strength to push him out. He made me.”

In the video below he’s alone in his cell, just months before sentencing. He does jumping jacks. He climbs up onto the table. Then he covers the light, the way he did at so many of his crime scenes.

Prosecutors asked to play it in court. The judge said no.

So on his last day in court, he was still the frail old man. Until the end, when he stood up out of the wheelchair, pulled off his mask and spoke in a loud, clear voice:

“I’ve listened to all your statements, each one of them. And I’m truly sorry to everyone I’ve hurt.”

Then he sat back down. He got 11 consecutive life sentences with no chance of parole.

Was the old man in that wheelchair real, or the last disguise of a man who fooled everyone for 40 years?

[cosmio @cosssmio]

@Zyron5m You can tell he's been correcting people about that for 34 years

[cosmio @cosssmio]

@versivald If I were Martin, I'd be asking the studio for a bigger check instead of expecting Will to take a smaller one.