Porn Valley – While porn websites and forums assemble their candidates for the Top 10 News stories in 2007, perhaps the most obvious choice is the one currently residing on the back burner.

That would be the protracted drama involving KSEX, www.ksex.com , its staff, management, and the future of the company.

With KSEX’s vice president Joe Brandi resigning on air December 19 thus providing a Who Shot J.R. cliffhanger to the already surreal mix, KSEX went on holiday hiatus. And with the timing of it all, KSEX has yet to make announcements regarding any subsequent plans after the holidays.

With Brandi’s public fart bomb, KSEX’s current owner Jon Belinkie immediately issued the kind of face-saving statement management usually reserves for those circumstances.

While Belinkie wished Brandi well, noting KSEX’s success under Brandi’s brief tenure, Belinkie also alluded to some big announcement. Possibly as early as last Friday. However, Belinkie, an insurance executive who runs KSEX out of an east coast office, has yet to respond beyond that. Part of which is the fact that Belinkie’s been vacationing in Hawaii.

Meanwhile, KSEX – in flux- is the target of ripe conjecture. It’s been thought that Porno Dan Leal- a Belinkie favorite- would be named in some managerial capacity. Some rumors have him being the next Sales Manager, which was part of Brandi’s old job.

On first glance, any move like that could be seen as an opportunity for giving KSEX a hands-on Belinkie presence in Porn Valley. Because it’s no secret that Belinkie’s been criticized for being an absentee landlord much in the way Chris Rick, the former owner, had been.

Although Belinkie differs from Rick in the fact that he’s more of an in-your-face-type. On top of that, Belinkie and current program director/station manager Lorraine Summers, aka Lorrainiac, don’t necessarily see eye-to-eye. Call it creative differences.

And Brandi, a long time friend of Lorrainiac, a salty woman who conducts a ribald two hours every day on air, often acted as a buffer and referee in matches where push almost came to shove a number of times between her and her ardent boss.

Then, again, Brandi and Belinkie were never known to waltz to the same tune, either. Brandi said as much when he announced on Lorrainiac’s show that, “It’s not a right fit and I have to move on.”

Since those who know Brandi, also know he loved KSEX, there had to be something deep rooted and irreconcilable about his sudden leaving.

Make no mistake. Brandi, hardly a dumb ass, didn’t just bail without any obvious irons in the fire. Although Brandi has yet to play any of his cards at that table.

Earlier this year, in a series of quick decisions after Wankus’ exit in early May [Belinkie unceremoniously dumped the former mainstream radio jock and long time KSEX personality on air], Lorrainiac was named to replace him. A circumstance she was never comfortable with.

At the outset, Lorrainiac, like Wankus, also a veteran of the mainstream, had been assigned favorite daughter status. But the mood accelerated over the weeks and months at KSEX to where Summers had become like a surrogate Wankus.

When Wankus took off, a couple of KSEX PJ’s [porn jocks], most notably Stormy Daniels, announced their leaving the station, basically in support of him.

While legal issues were being resolved, Wankus, who was part owner of KSEX, as well, remained quiet about his private rifts with Belinkie. In the mean time, KSEX left its old haunt in Burbank for new digs in Porn Valley. It was long felt that the Burbank location was unattractive and prohibited guests from making a trek to the studio during the murderous rush hour. And the move would have been a lot sooner, according to some stories – whether true or not- had it not been for the fact that Belinkie supposedly pissed off the landlord of the original location KSEX wanted to move to.

Then what was an equal surprise, Wankus, during the summer of this year, moved his show over to PrimeTimeUncensored, www.primetimeuncensored.com airing it on Wednesday nights.

But Wankus’ tenure in his brief stay on PTU wasn’t entirely stable, either. Wankus had a falling out [later resolved] with Tyler Faith who had also been his KSEX sidekick and who had come over with him to PrimeTime.

After Faith left, Nautica Thorn took over as his co-host. A couple of shows were postponed. Then Ann Marie, another former KSEX PJ, was supposed to have been brought in for an entire revamping that would meld porn with mainstream news and entertainment. That show never got off the ground.

Which didn’t make too much difference since PTU went into brief hiatus as well. Formerly a Monday to Friday on-air operation, similar to KSEX but not quite, PrimeTime now pre-tapes its shows on Saturdays.

On the KSEX front, rumors following the Wankus departure had Don Benn, another east coaster, being brought in, perhaps in some P.R capacity. Those were laid to rest when Brandi, a strong Internet presence, who had been operating his own porn news websites, was named Vice President.

Among his new duties, Brandi handled P.R. as well as securing ad revenue for KSEX.

The station, which had been operating in the red almost from the time of the tragic death of its former owner Mike Rick, Chris Rick’s brother, began turning the corner with Brandi’s business sense and aggressiveness. And the station’s bottom line, for all intents and purposes, seemed well secured by November. Brandi was bringing in new business including the prestigious Girls Gone Wild account. Along the way, Brandi also announced a deal with Rude.com that would bring in another potential 1.3 million listeners for KSEX.

And KSEX began making some intriguing talent moves in recent weeks, to boot. Brandi brought in Howard Stern personality Gary Garver to do a Thursday afternoon show and James Bartholet, who, like Garver, had a show on PrimeTimeUncensored, took the hour time slot preceding Garver’s.

But KSEX was not without some intervening soap opera hijinx. Ariel Summers and her husband Michael Kahn, who shared a Tuesday afternoon show, waged on-air war with talent Priscilla Russo which resulted in their firing. Anita Cannibal was receiving apparent death threats for some of the controversy she was bringing to her show. And Jason Sechrest who could no longer do his program on Monday or Wednesday afternoons, due to other commitments, was subsequently replaced Mondays by Porno Dan and his wise cracking co-host XXX Jay from OCcash.

Another fly arrived in the ointment when Dan, after a couple of weeks, was re-assigned a Friday night slot, thus taking an hour away from Powder and Heather Pink. On the face of it, a move to a 9pm graveyard slot on that night doesn’t seem very appealing, but the reality is that Dan’s show would now be heard in replay over the weekends and into Monday. There was some grumbling about it. But not from Dan who seemed quite amazed by the quick turn of events. Though some cynics claim he actually orchestrated it.

Besides bringing a version of nude twister and other adult party buffoonery to the KSEX format, Dan tried a promotion that involved content trades. But that Sunday experiment was dropped like a hot potato the first week when no one showed up for it.

Then Dan didn’t exactly ingratiate himself with some of the station’s talent, either, when a partnership he engineered with MidniteMonkey, a leading provider of adult mobile media services, was announced.

The deal would basically enable fans to stream KSEX TV programs to their mobile phone via ksexmobile.com. However, according to the way things currently are at KSEX, PJ’s don’t have ownership of their own shows. Not to mention the fact that they’re no longer being paid- as opposed to the twenty bucks they used to get- for their time on air.

Instead, the MidniteMonkey deal was perceived in some quarters as a financial win-win for Dan at the expense of the PJ’s.

Then, it didn’t help matters when Dan and Jay, particularly Jay, had some Rude.com issues on air during their abbreviated broadcast the Friday before Christmas- a controversial story that’s been airing both on GFY and the KSEX forums. Essentially Jay was pissed of with Rude.com over some alleged business dealings, and the entire relationship with KSEX could blow up in someone’s face.

Then with the AEE convention in January, PJ Dic Tracy, who had been brought in to secure a possible business relationship with ClubJenna for whom he shoots, was under the impression that he’d be covering the show for news content. Tracy, however, was told that Porno Dan was being given the assignment- a decision that must have come as a surprise, as well, to Tony Batman, the station’s resident party-goer and events hawker.

Besides the fact that Brandi’s leaving has left KSEX with no Publicist, Sales & Marketing person, the website hasn’t been updated – probably because of the hiatus. And sponsors who dealt only with Brandi are an issue, too, that has to be addressed.

And that’s where KSEX stands at the moment.