This guide is for all those people that are new to the community. Call it a brief explanation of what the industry does, the major companies within the industry, the major "methods" taught and the biggest differences between them.

This is intended as a guide to anyone out there finding these communities for the first time or wanting to do something but not really knowing where to start. This topic seeks to outline the options you have to choose from.

PUA - What is it?

PUA stands for Pick Up Artist/Artistry, it is the name that has become mainstream to label much of the industry. The industry offers various different methods and models for people to apply when attempting to attract others.

The Major Companies

(I will cover the general methods taught by each shortly)
RSD - Owned by Tyler Durden - Natural Game
Love Systems - Owned by Nick Savoy - Mystery Method derivative/natural
Style Life Academy - Owned by Neil Stauss (Style) - Mystery Method derivative/Natural
Venusian Arts - Owned by Erik Von Markovik (Mystery) Mystery Method
PUA Training - Owned by Richard La Ruina(Gambler) Inner game and natural
Speed Seduction - Owned by Ross Jeffries - NLP

PUA - A brief history

The industry started in 1992 with Ross Jeffries, owner of Speed Seduction.

Things got their major start from a student of his, Lewis Payne, who started a newsgroup called alt.seduction.fast in 1994. The group grew quickly and many of the most well known personalities got their start there. Back in the day spam was much harder to combat and the group became almost unusable, due to this spin off communities started appearing.

Alongside these spin off communities other teachers started appearing and teaching, at this point they weren't really companies though, they were individual personalities trying to make a mark by themselves. The most success at this time was David De Angelo in 2000

Around the same time period Mystery(Erik) released Mystery Method and started Project Hollywood(which later caved in due to personality issues and a whole host of other reasons that are constantly debated and argued which I won't go into). Mystery started Mystery Method Corporation with Nick Savoy.

Other companies appeared out of the ashes of Project Hollywood, Real Social Dynamics being most notable.

In 2005 Style (Neil Strauss) published "The Game", it became the main starting point for most people in the community and gave a huge amount of publicity to the industry.

In 2006 cracks started to show in Mystery Method Corp, Mystery left the company and founded Venusian Arts. Mystery Method Corp changed it's name to Love Systems. Around the same time Richard La Ruina founded PUA Training. Style formed Style Life Academy during 2006.

In the time since the founding of these companies there have been many, many other companies founded. The above 6 remain the major players in the industry.

Other than these companies, many individuals have also made appearances and successful names for themselves without being tied down to a company. Many of these names will make appearances at events for multiple companies.

The Main Methods

I'm going to try and explain these without any bias. In order of their founding.

NLP:
This method focuses on the use of Neuro-Linguistic Programming(NLP). The essentials of this method focus on the concept that we are biologically wired to respond to situations and develop behaviour patterns universal to all of us, the idea is that these patterns can be read and manipulated by systematically changing them.
NLP's use in PUA also utilises various methods seen in hypnosis.

Mystery Method:
This method uses a very structured approach. It breaks a "pick up" down into 9 different specific parts under 3 phases - Attraction, comfort and Seduction.
It takes an indirect approach (not showing the woman you are attracted to her) and makes use of canned(practiced) lines, routines and games such as magic tricks/jokes/stories/etc.

Natural:
This method seeks to do away with canned material and teach people to be better overall people. It argues that using canned material is simply like putting on a mask and seeks to help men better themselves entirely by improving things such as confidence, self esteem, etc. Natural methods generally focus upon state of mind and improving overall techniques such as conversational skills, flirting, energy, etc.

(Ok, that was completely bias)


I just realised the clocks go back tonight. I'm going to bed. If anyone feels that anything should be added to this let me know. It's by no means complete.

I thought it'd be helpful to new people. I know it's not really important to you but that meme is generally used to say "nobody cares". It's good for new folk to understand things and know what the options are. Hopefully educating people might increase the number of guests who become users.

The idea is to make people feel slightly less overwhelmed by the number of sources trying to give them information.

By explaining what the major companies are and what they offer in a simple and understandable way devoid of marketing spiel rather than leaving them to drown in the tidal wave of information that gets thrown at them.

That's your opinion. So you're of the opinion that people should be told what is right opposed to being given the opportunity to make an informed and free decision themselves?

I don't really agree with that. People are all different and while I may have opinions on each I think people are capable of making their own informed decisions rather than being told outright.

The goal here was to inform, not to instruct.

Needs? No. Wants? Absolutely.

Many people generally don't like getting into things(usually) without feeling informed on the topic. Many people won't just take what they're told as true(thankfully), they'd like to find out for themselves. This information gives the basics and the start of the decision making process.

If some don't get that information then they'll simply give up before beginning.

The closest thing to a valid history of the early days of the industry that I've been able to find was on pualingo. I'm not sure which company owns that site though, it feels MM bias and misses out a good amount of what I mentioned here. Wikipedia is also incredibly scarce on information, Mystery's article has zero mention of Project Hollywood for example which was in a way a joint headquarters of multiple teachers and the center of everything, for a little while.

Come on RLAJay's where the reply its been almost an hour this is better than Family Guy.

Calm down K, no need to go off on one.

I made an assumption that's where you were going with it, saying "it doesn't matter" made me assume that your stance would be "what matters is what's right for them, they don't need the other information" I actually agree with that. However that means people have to just blindly follow what they're told is correct opposed to giving them all the options and letting them choose and learn what they would prefer to do. There will always be a subset that want all the information regardless of whether it's relevant or not, without that information they won't participate. Hence giving it to them and sigging it.

That's all well and good but neither options actually give that subset of people what they wanted in the first place, open information that allows them to make their own decision.. Confrontational behaviour only contributes to scaring people away, people who in general are new, insecure, low on self esteem and in need of a friendly and welcoming attitude opposed to one that greets them with confrontational WRONG, WRONG, WRONG.

As I said before, it doesn't matter doesn't actually give them what they wanted and coupled with the "fuck off" attitude all it does is show people with insecurities an unhelpful and scary environment.

Humouring their basic desire to understand the background and foundation from which everything comes from greets people in a manner that's more accommodating to the mental state that they have when brand new to such a community. As they become more a part of the community they will become steadily assimilated into the more confident attitude and mindset of the community as they learn what the general principles followed by the more prolific posters are.

In short, I agree with you that it's unnecessary to know any of this but I believe there is no harm in catering to the more obvious early questions in order to present a welcoming environment that better caters to what they think they need at first. This means they will then inevitably learn from the community what they actually need.

I'm reading what you're writing, you're not reading what I'm writing. I agree with you, but unlike you I also acknowledge the fact that it's better to pull people in with the information they think they need in order to give them the real information they need - opposed to sending them elsewhere to seek it which is usually quite inevitable if people want to know something and are rejected the answer.

It's a neutral piece as a means to an end.

You've actually done good sparking this debate though, anyone reading it will also learn that this information isn't actually what they need. They can however still learn that here and get guidance along the "journey" they'll go on as they slowly make changes within themselves.

Point being that the information they want gets them to hang around long enough to be given the information they need. If they don't get the information they want then they will go elsewhere for it regardless of being told it's unnecessary to know. You might say something like that's fine, they should but I think that this post doesn't do any harm but does good if it helps in attracting people to stick around for a while.

Bag of shit is a little harsh, my post was an attempt at neutrality. You added a bit of personal forum bias to it(that I agree with, but was not what I was going for originally)

You say that turning away from it would be better for them but wouldn't you say it's more likely that they'll just end up at a location that's more likely to feed them "bullshit"? What's better? Keeping them around to offer guidance or leaving them to fend for themselves?

Quite surprised that this has turned solely into a debate between us here. Where's the rest of the forum gone? 100+ views and no input from anyone else on the original post or this debate? Anybody out there?

You can't ask me to to read into things that have no sign of a joke in the writing while at the same time telling me off for reading into other things you write. Make your mind up.

EDIT: Not to mention that some of the jokes here often go over the regulars' heads, forcing the clarification ensures future readers don't also read it incorrectly.