Virtual sex partners who perform according to their masters' every whim, regardless how kinky, even to the point of inciting surreal orgasms whenever, however and as often as their human desires.
Commuters using "portable porn" devices to view and interact with sexy models and actresses on handheld devices as they endure what before were endlessly boring hours on the subway, train or bus.
Sex so real the viewer seems to be part of the action, beamed directly to a consumer whenever he or she wants it.
If all this sounds like something out of a science fiction novel, you're right. If it sounds too good to be true, you haven't been paying attention.
The adult industry is racing ever closer toward the kind of life science fiction writers have envisioned for nearly 100 years: Worldwide networks through which users define almost every aspect of their personal experience according to individual whims, needs and fantasies. Technologies currently exist to make much of this possible, though they remain imperfect. But recent developments unveiled at the Las Vegas Internext in January indicate the adult industry is well on its way to making such dreams an affordable consumer reality.
Are we nearing the American Dream of a chicken in every pot, a car in every garage and a sexual superstar in every bedroom? With the advent of wireless video streaming, the increasing availability of broadband Internet access and advances in the technology underlying virtual reality, the answer just may be "yes."
Show and Tell
The three days in January 2001 that encompassed the world's largest gathering of adult Webmasters attracted about 150 exhibitors from at least 13 countries. Another 5,000 international visitors attended the event, talking with vendors and witnessing demonstrations of the newest trends in cybersex. While the atmosphere resembled, at least in some aspects, something one might witness on an adult Website, in an erotic video or at a "gentlemen's club," most of the activity more closely resembled that at any other trade show: Visitors sampled wares, sealed deals and won prizes in dizzying numbers. After hours, they partied hearty well into the next morning.
The show floor itself was packed with a head-spinning variety of content offerings and affiliate programs. Among the most heavily trafficked exhibits were those hosted by Internet-based radio stations like KSEXRadio.com and the insanely popular voyeur cam programs � now beaming across the Net from every corner of the globe � like PantherPalace.com, PragGirls.com and CandidCam's network of sites.
Thirteen seminars accompanied the convention. During those, attendees were enlightened about a variety of subjects to which all of them - newbies, wannabes and old hands - could relate. From the first day's offerings - primarily aimed at those considering or having just embarked upon projects within the scope of the adult Web - to the intimate details of applicable law, payment processing and technological prophecy, seminar panels played to packed houses for almost three days.
On the show floor, seminar attendees attempted to put to good use the flood of new information packing their heads and the notes and collateral materials they would carry home with them. Overriding all seemed to be the notion that the adult Web was pushing the technology envelope constantly farther, and those who didn't at least plan for the future today would be left behind by the middle of next week...
Blazing Trails
Adult products and services traditionally have represented the vanguard of entertainment and technology. In the 1980s, when audiotext was the wave in the adult industry, consenting adults could call 1-800, 1-900 and sometimes even local numbers to connect with others of like mind and sexual appetites � for a price. Called "service bureaus," the companies that provided the live and/or recorded products delivered by premium telephone services began to see their industry collapse in the late 1980s and early ,90s, due to changes in telecommunications laws and telecommunication companies' policies.
Industry stalwarts like Trodat and Perception Sales Inc. still provide pay-per-call phone services, but they and others have broadened their product lines to include telephone-based membership billing services for Internet sites. SexNet Personals even allows users to connect with each other directly and anonymously through Websites employing special "dialer" applications. Other companies, like Global Cash Solutions, ITelBill, Niteline Media, IntelliPlus, Telpay and others have become "gateway" providers for alternative payment solutions that re-route customer traffic through international Internet access providers at premium rates.
In the 1970s, adult was the first industry to exploit videotape for the distribution of moving pictures. Advances in that technology led to the development and distribution of adult videos and films on CD-ROM and digital videodisc (DVD). CD-ROM as a distribution medium was very short lived due to the quality limitations of the medium, but DVD continues to be pushed to new and more interactive heights. One DVD can contain not only a full-length adult feature, but also additional material like star interviews, outtakes and behind-the-scenes looks at the making of the final product.
During the year 2000, top adult video production companies like Vivid Interactive, VCA and Wicked Pictures experimented with interactive DVDs (already a mainstay of companies like Digital Playground and Digital Sin) - those that allow viewers to direct at least part of the action they witness. The interactivity concept is nothing new to the adult Web. Prior even to the widespread availability of the Internet, computer-based chat rooms connected by telephone lines - or BBSes - were popular regionally. That phenomenon easily migrated to the Web, where it continued to morph and grow. For at least the past two years, big players in the online adult world (Pornication, for example) have offered interactive video chat, and that type of content remains popular with users.
Chat took new directions with the advent of programs like a special dialer from 2TalkNow that allows Internet chat room users to call each other through a Website interface and remain anonymous even after their conversation is over, unless they choose to reveal their identities and contact information proactively.
Today, the hottest adult products are those delivered electronically via Internet technologies that seem to blur the line between fantasy and reality. The Virtual Sex Machine, brainchild of inventor Eric J. White, founder of Virtual Reality Innovations, is one example. Certainly not the first of its kind but potentially the most employable, it was unveiled in its latest incarnation at Internext. The company's booth might not have attracted as much attention, perhaps, as some of the flashier exhibits, but the VSM was seen by many observers as one of the most forward-thinking efforts at the convention, if not necessarily a perfect example of its potential.
Designed exclusively for men (although a version for women is in beta phase, according to White), when attached to a computer the VSM allows a user to experience penile stimulation approximating physical contact in response to electronic cues embedded in media such as CD-ROMs, DVDs and Internet streaming video. Fitted over the penis and programmed to be in sync with the action on the screen at all times, the VSM translates the cues into a combination of massage, vibration and vacuum that allows the user to imagine himself in the middle of the action he is witnessing.
"Entertainment is no longer a passive medium," White said.
An early version of the contraption received PC Magazine's "Peripheral of the Year" award in 1998.
Far from being limited only to the sense of touch, virtual reality modeling also is making major strides in the visual arts. Anything3D Inc., primarily a "mainstream" company exhibiting for the first time in an adult environment, introduced its Photo3D product at Internext. Photo3D employs a special turntable-camera-JavaScript combination that takes and then combines a series of photographic images into a realistic, three-dimensional form that can be displayed and manipulated digitally. The image can be rotated 360 degrees, magnified selectively, zoomed piece by piece, even have its colors changed - all at the whim of the end user. Any movements the object makes during the photographic process are rendered within the final image in smooth, seamless transition, so the resulting 360-degree representation moves flawlessly and naturally.
Coming Attractions
More innovative new technologies wait in the wings for adoption, according to attorney Frederick S. Lane III and Directrix President Don McDonald. McDonald, formerly a director of the Spice Network, said one of the major obstacles to the implementation of really exciting new technology on the Web is the shortage of high-bandwidth connections on the user end.
"(Broadband is) going to have a very big impact on the adult industry," McDonald said, noting that issues peculiar to broadband media delivery - like "stream theft" and profitability margins - delay the adult industry from pushing for wider availability of the connection technology. "New solutions for stream theft are becoming available, and the use of ?intelligent bandwidth' will let us guarantee delivery using existing networks by pushing video out to the network once and letting it be relayed repeatedly from there (thereby increasing profitability)," he said.
According to McDonald, video on demand over the Net - using "intelligent bandwidth" to optimize delivery at the user's reception speed and in the user's native language - will be the biggest advantage the adult Web industry sees as a result of wider deployment of broadband consumer connections.
"Intelligent bandwidth is critical in a broadband environment," he said.
Lane, author of the book Obscene Profits: The Entrepreneurs of Pornography in the Cyber Age (Routledge 2000), an adult Internet trend spotter and seminar coordinator for Internext, noted that only 42 percent of U.S. households currently have any kind of ?Net access; less than 2 percent enjoy broadband Internet access. Those figures are predicted to change dramatically within the next year as consumer prices for cable and digital subscriber line connections plummet and availability skyrockets, he said.
Lane also said satellite Internet access is years away from perfection, and cable's heyday may be coming to an end.
"I think you'll see DSL overtake cable in the next few years," he said. "It's more reliable and expandable."
Both men agreed that the legal and ethical questions yet to be answered concerning broadband delivery are legion; concerns raised by issues like the "community standards" test for obscenity and copyright violations will multiply as broadband access becomes more readily available.
"There is technology now to determine where calls are coming from; therefore you need to be aware of local community standards," Lane said. "It's the same problem the audiotext industry faced several years ago.
"And copyright issues may become the adult Web's Achilles heel," he continued, referring to various high-profile intellectual-property theft cases that have plagued the industry recently. "Remember: It wasn't murder and mayhem that got Al Capone, but income tax problems."
Broadband isn't the only technology revolution just around the corner, according to those at the forefront of the burgeoning wireless access protocol (WAP) delivery infrastructure. Paul Frey, chief technology officer of SinPalm and PK Technology, said streaming content via wireless connection will be available widely within the next year.
Because the so-called "wireless Web" is necessarily restricted by bandwidth limitations, designers of traditional adult Websites need to revise their perceptions of cyberspace to deal with the emerging medium effectively, Frey said.
"Customization of content is key," he said, noting that current transmission rates for wireless delivery reach their maximum at 9600 baud per second (today's typical dial-up modems transmit at about 56,000 bps). "(In the wireless world,) give users only what they want to see. They're offended by having to download other stuff (like banners and other advertisements)."
The current proliferation of wireless devices like cellular phones and personal digital assistants will lead to phenomenal growth and development of WAP's potential for the adult Web in the very near future, Frey predicted. That the devices are ubiquitous, in itself, will demand advances in WAP technology - and because it already has set the precedent, the adult Web should begin now to lead the way into full-scale adoption of the underlying delivery technology, he said.
Everything Old is New Again
The technology underlying content delivery methods is not the only front on which radical change is occurring. Even the ways in which companies promote themselves has undergone metamorphosis in recent years. Although print remains the most common format for promotional materials, more companies are investing in CD-ROM-based brochures, manuals and interactive demonstrations - not only because the digital media provide a better venue for their sales presentations, but also because they are easier for both the companies and their potential customers to transport, store and use.
Still, it bears mentioning that not every new technology is, will be or CAN be embraced by every end user. Regardless how advanced the delivery and reception technologies in the U.S. and other techno-savvy countries become, there always will be consumers who hunger for cybersex in its most "primitive" forms.
"New people get ?wired' every day," said one Internext attendee, who asked to be identified only as Alan. "Like the rest of us, they need the opportunity to explore and discover the Web on their own terms. When they first begin, they may not be ready for the cutting-edge stuff that's out there. Why not make things available to them that they can understand and that their computer can handle? Then, when they upgrade their equipment, let them get involved with the more sophisticated adult offerings.
"Not everyone is ready for the bleeding edge of adult the moment they hit the Web."
That sentiment, in essence, is why some companies offer a range of products designed to appeal to everyone from the most basic viewers to users who demand the most technology-intensive wares. Among the offerings at megasites like CartoonBucks and Cybererotica are galleries of thousands of pulse-quickening still images that require only the most basic of browsers to enjoy, and both companies say those areas of their sites remain incredibly popular.
Sponsors, for their part, seem to be re-exploring ground that for a while seemed to have gone fallow. Companies like TopCash, Cybererotica, Cyber Entertainment Network, Babenet and Redhot Network have re-instituted programs that, at face value, seem to take a giant step backward in the affiliate payment game. While they continue to pay Webmaster affiliates finders fees for new-customer sign-ups, they've also re-instituted pay-per-click programs like those offered when the adult Web was young.
Regardless of the approach surfers and the companies who serve them take to the continuing adventure that is the adult Web, one fact remains constant: Nothing in the adult realm of cyberspace is static. Change - whether rushing headlong into adoption of new delivery models or mining the past for under-exploited financial benefit � is the only unchanging aspect of the medium. And, of course, truth remains in the maxim that where the adult industry goes, the mainstream world is sure to follow.
"More mainstream companies are working with adult all the time," said Directrix's McDonald, whose own company is involved primarily in mainstream pursuits. "(Adult) is where the solutions will come from - and it's the only segment of the Internet economy making any real money." *
