Note: I'm the technical webmaster (aka "pagemonkey") for PSO; rather than recuse myself from participating in this review, I have decided my promise not to inflate my impression of this site, given as the words of a gentlemen, will suffice.

That said, let's visit the Rockies, m'kay?

My first exposure to the doings at Pat and Sam happened when I saw a handful of images posted in Badpuppy's contributor section way back in early 2003. I ran across a familiar face - Cody Alexander, who launched under the name "Austin" - although he looked a bit younger than last time I'd seen his sexy mug and his fine, manly bod. (I'm accustomed to that - the Gay adult web is a bit like time travel, because you often find "new" material which actually pre-dates last weeks' "new" material by an appreciable stretch of time.)

Back to the biz in hand - I typed the www.patandsam.com address into my browser and landed at a very basic website which was jam packed with hot male flesh I'd never seen before.

As I'm privvy and savvy to the inside poop on how things work at Pat and Sam, I'll leak it to you.

The owners are the recruiters, photographers and editors - the only thing they outsource is the "physical" construction of the site - so it's a refreshing place to visit, being a truly independant operation with it's own distinct flavor and texture.

As far as they guys you'll find there, well, it's a real buffet. They bring in all sorts of guys, a few of whom I've met, and each guy has some particular charm making him noteworthy and interesting. The forte is to allow each guy to comfortably find his own level - whether it's a one-off solo or some sort of day-long orgy like the Saturday Marathon. As far as the photo and video quality goes, both could be better in a technical sense - but there is a very good reason they're not.

Pat and Sam remains true to its amateur roots. When dealing with first timers, great gobs of lighting and a "cast of thousands" scurrying about making sure things are visually perfect is a great way to end up with a technically excellent product depicting a guy who's too scared to let his pecker get happy.

Technical considerations aside, photo and video composition is excellent, and the editing is skilled with a deliberate minimalist approach that focuses on revealing the guy in front of the lens rather than revealing how clever one can be editing video.

What it boils down to is this: Pat and Sam is all about the guys showing off, not the folks behind the scenes. The website itself is old-school and was designed to do one thing and do it well - put the meat in your face.

Pat and Sam made me 

Pat and Sam features amateur guys that you would see just about anywhere around your town. These guys are not going to be featured in Men Magazine or GQ, but you might see a few in Car and Driver and Field and Stream. I find no site description in its tour to determine what the mission of the site is other than using amateur male action in its title.

If the mission of the site is to present amateur guys in an amateur format with amateur photography, the site succeeds.

Of the several solo videos that I sampled, the guys have personality, even when answering very personal questions posed by the photographer at the beginning of their video. The solo videos are pretty much set up with the model sitting in front of the camera, asked to remove his clothes and then get down to business and jerkoff while watching a porno. Most of the models show no creativity in terms of positions, stroking techniques, etc. that you see on other sites.

Actually, these videos pretty much mimic what you do while you jerkoff off. I like that authenticity.

The first video, that I viewed with a couple having sex, bored me to death. There was no appreciable chemistry between the two guys. I kept thinking that if I received a blowjob like the one model was performing, I'd have fallen asleep halfway through the sex act. And try as I might, I could not fast forward it like I wanted. I wish I could tell you the outcome, but I stopped it to view another.

The second video that I sampled had a guy giving another guy a blow job in a video booth. The lighting and amateur photography worked well here because you felt you were peeking into the booth to watch the action.

The third video featured two guys basically stroking themselves, though in the middle of the video, they stroke each other a little bit. The one model looked so bored during the entire video that it totally turned me off. The description for this video says in an excusatory fashion, "So, what we have here, dear fans, is a rather odd video. It just starts with them jerking off together on then they get off. I'm afraid I have to ask you to use your imagination regarding what happened before the cameras turned on. Let's just say that we were all just about worn out." My imagination says nothing extremely exciting happened.

The site design is basic and navigating through the site is quite easy.

The photography is generally below average, suffering from a lack of adequate lighting. My guess is that the models are photographed with a camera with a low quality flash. The videos that I sampled lacked adequate lighting, were sometimes out of focus, were very jittery at different times and had some rough transitions in their editing.

Pat and Sam made me 

Another Pat and Sam feature is that almost all videos are available on DVD or VHS. In this case, it is not an upsell because everything is available in the member area for subscribers.