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.

Peace,

kowalski

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 adding one more source.


Peace,

kowalski

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.

Get off it, Jay. "It doesn't matter" - that would be good advice. If someone thinks it matters, they need help not indulgence.


Peace,

kowalski

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.

... and my posts filled in what you missed out. Go me!

You honestly think anyone needs that information?


Peace,

kowalski

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.

What is all this?

If someone asked me how the community got started, I'd tell them "It doesn't matter" then ask why they wanted to know and work on from there (or "Fuck off" depending on my mood at the time). "It doesn't matter" is not an instruction ("Fuck off" is), don't get things twisted.

How do you get this ...

... from this ...

? Because it certainly isn't there in my words.

If someone wants to know this shit and asks me they can listen to what I have to say on the subject and then, if they still want to, they can find it out for themselves (or they can just "Fuck off"). I won't tell them, because I have infinitely better things to tell a person who asks a question like that and so, I believe, do you.

Jay, snap back to reality - You honestly think that the best thing for people who want, or think they need, this post and for whom if it doesn't exist they will leave the community is to give them this post? Please don't continue to profess that this is valuable information for anyone and that people who seek this information here couldn't do better to be told "It doesn't matter".


Peace,

kowalski