Just as the Kinsey report (Sexual Behavior in the Human Male (1948) and Sexual Behavior in the Human Female (1953)) shocked American society with its candid analysis of self-reported human sexual behaviour, so the increasing public exposure of a modern generation to the new wave of adult film celebrities in all media has changed perceptions of both deviancy and sexuality. The public are given exposure in chat shows and magazine articles to adult “porn” stars who, other than their recorded explicit sexual antics, come across as being essentially normal everyday people with whom the public can identify. A society which had until recently been “repressed” by a social order completely intolerant of public nudity, which it termed “indecent exposure”, and which portrayed the naked human form as inherently wicked and impure, was suddenly liberated by the explosion of a new adult medium which it was powerless to censor. Magazines, television, video, DVD, web sites, newspapers, broadband satellite and bill boards have suddenly come to revere the naked human form as an icon, to be universally worshipped, admired and adored. One could almost start to imagine that a latent ancient primeval human race had once again started to relax in celebration of its natural state.
Finally technology was able to supply a limitless stream of naked and explicit images of the human form in all forms of sexual activity, ever more rapidly, ever more readily and ever more privately. At last the inhibited user could be assured complete anonymity and join the growing mass of consumers of adult material. Adult images could be piped on demand to any home, hotel room, private club or office by cable, satellite or the Internet. Adult content providers could now distribute discretely to a wealthier, more socially conscious and more sexually sophisticated consumer.
Perhaps society’s greatest conscious denial is the essential truth that our bodies serve above all else as the carriers of genes, and as such, our behaviour is principly directed towards sex, reproduction and survival to this end. Attractive bodies and faces must therefore carry attractive genes, and to an adult of reproductive age, or an sexually developing teenager, there can be no greater eye candy than a sexually fertile and fit naked human body. Behavioral scientists have even gone so far as to suggest that all social behaviours, other than those directed at elemental survival, must be interpreted as giving some sexual or reproductive advantage. Thus the adult industry is perhaps the oldest and most central of all human industries, as it most closely defines the reason for our social existence. Thus sex is the reason why we crave better cars, bigger houses and better bodies. The adult industry provides images and standards for this fundamental market, defining sexual attraction with new human icons, rather than existing as some bizarre new fashion through which consumers can dispose of residual income.
Adult video rentals and sales peaked in the United States in 1997 at $4.2 billion, with a subsequent fall due to the emergence of the Internet and increased subscription to cable and satellite television. Indirectly large-capacity hard drives, recordable CDs and VCRs provide the hardware for home recording, an activity encouraged by the adult industry if not the film and music industries. In addition to the rapid growth of X-rated sites on the Net, the popularity of adult entertainment can be tracked through the growing number of video titles being produced. Ten years ago 1,275 hardcore titles hit the market, compared with 11,041 for 2000, according to AVN who claim that the increase in video production is continuing to escalate, aided by new technology that makes it much cheaper and easier to produce.
Of course the Internet is but one head of a global hydra, and it has been suggested that as long ago as 1986 there were some 500,000 sex workers in the US with a combined annual revenue of US$20 billion. The National Task Force on Prostitution suggests that over one million people in the US have worked as prostitutes in the United States, or about 1% of all American women. Figures for the number of people employed in production, distribution, hosting or otherwise involved in the online adult content sector vary greatly. The size of the black market of illegal brothels, call girls, escorts, strip joints and illegal sex workers cannot even begin to be estimated, and undeclared profits from the black market may even exceed those of the legitimate adult industry.
The global adult market is estimated at $56 billion, and major corporate players such as Hilton Hotels, Marriott International, EchoStar Communications Corp., On Command and LodgeNet Entertainment all have large financial investments in the adult industry. For instance Hilton and Marriott hotels distribute X-rated shows, whist On Command and LodgeNet serve as adult content providers. The Wall Street Journal reported in November that Comcast Corp., Cox Communications Inc., Cablevision Systems Corp., Charter Communications Inc. and Insight Communications Co. all carry the Hot Network porn channel, which both AT&T and GM have signed. Owned by the Vivid Entertainment Group, the Hot Network quickly is becoming one of the best-selling commodities on cable and satellite television. Vivid, an adult content producer and distributor, has unashamed ambitions for the global market.
As the future moves towards wide screen integrated entertainment, with combined TV, computer and Internet applications, this market can only be expected to increase in the face of greater use and availability. On-line adult sites have succeeded all expectations by developing new technologies and original marketing strategies. Danni's Hard Drive first made its debut in 1995 and continues to surprise market analysts. Danni Ashe fuels her softcore adult empire through subscriptions alone with no banner advertising and reportedly earnt $8 million in 2001. Larry Flynt Publications, a conglomerate of movies, strip clubs, sex emporiums and Internet sites is currently estimated to have a value of $400 million. Another industry leader, the Internet Entertainment Group (IEG), claims more than 700,000 paid-subscribers with over 40% growth each year. At one point in 1998, IEG reported making $40,000 per day from live Web casts on one site alone.
It is often said that "Pornography is the handmaiden of new technologies" and the advent of 3G phone handsets only promises yet further growth in the adult industry. Indeed Penthouse and Playboy have already entered into basic licensing deals with mobile phone firms, and the early focus will be on "3G as a marketing channel to drive consumers to magazines, videos and the Internet" rather than as an adult content delivery system. That is until the technology speeds up within an ever faster cycle of development. Strategy Analytics considered that a legitimate market exists for mobile adult-oriented services which may amount to $1 billion by 2008, some 5% of projected mobile entertainment service revenues.
The Forrester Group have suggested that at least 19% of North American Internet users are regular visitors to adult content sites. Rather than supporting the popular prejudice that such people are lonely, single males, nearly 1 in 4 are women, 46% are married, and 33% have children. There have been studies conducted by two universities that suggest that at least 200,000 Americans now are addicted to Internet pornography, almost certainly held to be an underestimate. According to Nielsen NetRatings, over 20 million Web surfers visited porn sites from their homes in October 2000, an upwards trend. More seriously 16% of office workers connected to the Internet clicked onto adult content sites as well.