christophe thinks out loud

Radio Blowfish is on the air

Oh, right. So, Blowfish now has a once-every-two-weeks podcast. We've done two of them so far, and they've been a blast.

One of the things I love more than anything else is learning about new technology. One of the things I love least about learning about new technology is learning the ways in which new technology is broken. For example:

• Apparently, there is some magical combination of MP3 tags which, if set or not set (yeah, OK, I'm behind on diagnosing this one) will prevent iTunes from copying an MP3 file to an older-generation iPod.
• Some MP3 players assume that the underlying sample rate on an audio file is 44.1kHz, and will play it back at that rate no matter what the actual sample rate is. This is not so good if you sampled your show at 32kHz, unless your target audience likes the idea of the Chipmunks discussing sex toys.

For whatever reason, the iTunes Music Store hasn't listed us. Bastards. You can listen anyway, though.

Dubya Pays the Rent

If you watch adult movies, or watch adult content on the Internet, and you voted for George Bush, you should be fucking ashamed of yourself.

During Bush's first term, the War on Pornography that John Ashcroft was going to announce on September 11, 2001 (before that became a very, very big news day) was pretty much set aside and forgotten, no doubt because it would have seemed a somewhat questionable use of Justice Department resources.

But the evangelicals, for whom the whole porn thing is a bigger, hotter burning issue than all the US servicemen lost in Iraq, turned out in force in November, and George W. Bush, he pays his bills.

I'm not going into a long, boring technical explaining about the new regulations that the Department of Justice published in early May, and which come into effect on June 23rd. Nominally, of course, they are to Protect the Children. Isn't everything? But, equally of course, they have absolutely nothing to do with protecting children.

What they are trying to do, and what they may well do unless the Supreme Court steps in, is shut down the adult video business.

The reality is that it has become very hard, almost impossible, to get an obscenity conviction anymore. This is not surprising, because it's hard to get anyone to really care about what people watch in their homes. The world has changed, we've all moved on, and obscenity as a crime is starting to sound as quaint as prosecuting someone for blasphemy.

But for the religious right, this issue is never going to go away. This is holy war, and they are going to win this one. And the Bush administration is ready to help. If you can't get an obscenity conviction, what can you do?

You can do what the government does best: Regulate.

You have an adult video at home, right? Of course you do. PIck it up, and look at the case. Somewhere, there's going to be a legend saying something about “18 USC 2257” on it. To make a long story short, that's a law that Congress passed way back in 1988, requiring every producer of adult videos to keep records about every single performer, nominally to prove that the performers were 18 or older at the time of production.

At the time, the regulations were tedious, but not impossible to comply with. The fact that failing to keep the right records was a Federal felony for which you could do 10 years in prison certainly focused everyone's mind.

And, to the DoJ, that was precisely the problem. If they started raiding producers, and the producers had all their records in order and everything was fine, then it would start looking like a big waste of time.

So, they changed the regs. Now, the producer who actually makes the film doesn't just have to keep the documentation. The documentation has to be available for inspection, without notice, at any time between 9am to 5pm Monday through Friday. If they knock on the door at 9am, and you aren't there because you were having your car worked on? 10 years.

Further, now, every single web site, every single magazine that publishes things for which documentation is required must have copies of that documentation. Every single one. Every single document. I'm sure that all the adult models out there are excited by the idea that a webmaster they have never met now will get copies of their driver's license.

It goes on. It is, in fact, impossible to comply with the new regulations. And that's precisely the point. The DoJ doesn't want producers to comply. They want to be able to knock on doors, discover that the documentation wasn't indexed properly (also a requirement of the regs), and toss someone into jail for a few years. They can't knock on every door, but they won't have to: We'll all get the message pretty quickly.

And will this protect children? Oh, please, don't insult anyone's intelligence. I have a news flash: Child pornography was already illegal. There is absolutely nothing in this law or these regulations that was required to put makers of child pornography out of business. People who make child pornography do not put legends on their videos telling the Federal government where their records can be found. This will be as effective a deterrent against actual child pornography as asking someone at passport control if they are planning to blow anything up.

And all of you who voted for George Bush? This is what you voted for. You went into the voting booth, thought carefully, and said, “Yes, I want all makers of adult videos to spend 10 years in Federal prison.” If you somehow manage to persuade yourself that Bush doesn't really care about this, that it's all happening without his consent and encouragement, you are delusional. And if you somehow believe that having a government which is willing to throw people in jail just to pay electoral bills somehow makes you “safer” than the alternative, you are morally deficient.

Sex Workers' Art Show

Well, this looks interesting. I'll try to check it out when it comes to San Francisco.

Blowfish Friends and Lovers #1

I'm writing this while reviewing the latest edit for the next Blowfish video, Blowfish Friends and Lovers, #1. It's the first in our series of tapes of “real couples” being interviewing about sex and performing, and then having sex for the camera.

The editor did a really superb job on this one, and made quite the silk purse out of the sow's ear of footage from my camera (camera 1 was run by a professional, and was much, much better). He even managed to work around the recycling truck that made a mess of the audio of the first interview segment.

The music is also really good. I love working with professionals.

Today was a really, really crummy day, but I now remember how much I enjoy what I do for a living.

Do as we say, not as we do, eBay Division

PayPal has strict policies against processing payments for adult material.

Unless, of course, that adult material is being sold off of eBay, which owns PayPal.

If they catch you processing payment for adult material through them, they'll embargo the money in your account for 180 days. Getting 180 days free interest on nasty porno money has nothing to do with it. PayPal wouldn't sully themselves like that. They need to sit on your cash for 180 days to make sure, um, the money isn't infected with sex industry cooties, or something. It's for your own good.

Thus does sex make hypocrites of us all.

And in case you were wondering why Blowfish doesn't take PayPal for payment, that's why.

Tony's got his blog on.

Tony Comstock, a filmmaker who made a wonderful film Blowfish carries, now has a blog.

Bet you can't repress just one

My friend Jamais forwarded this incredible essay by Nina Hartley.

A lot of porn squicks me. I was extremely ambivalent about Extreme Associates' obscenity prosecution. But the mind is always cleared by one fundamental truth: When government is turned loose on an idea, they will not stop when you want them to.

Now, we just have to give the monkeys credit cards

A new study found that male monkeys will give up their juice rewards in order to ogle pictures of female monkey's bottoms. The way the experiment was set up, the act is akin to paying for the images, the researchers say.

So, what was that about porn being unnatural?

Why I hate being in the sex business

Conversation with commercial landlord:

Me: “Hi, I'm calling about the space at 174 Valencia?”

Scumball landlord: “Oh, yes! What were you thinking of putting in here?”

Me: “(describes Blowfish)”

Scumball landlord: (pause) “It's rented, but I have another space at (extremely scary and impossible-to-rent part of town)...”

Me: “Thanks for your time.” *click*

The BBC Goes Porn

The BBC finally got around to covering the HIV scare in the porn industry. Although the level of reporting is up to the BBC's usual high standard, the article has the usual anthropological feel to it. I'm still waiting for the mainstream-media reportage about porn that is more insight than sweeps-week.

The quote that stood out for me was:

The producers blame the performers, and cannot believe they have not banded together to demand that condoms be used.

Those whacky performers! All the producers would love, just love for them to all to use condoms, but since they aren't demanding it . . . well, what can we do?

Well, of course, producers could require it, but I guess they are quivering in fear in front of the all-powerful Porn Actors Guild, or something.

For an adult business, porn has a lot of growing up to do.

A helpful tip for porn producers

A valid ID has the following characteristics:

• It was issued by a government agency. (Hint: Blockbuster is not a government agency.)
• It has a photograph of the person on it. (A photograph of a person who is a close relative or who looks vaguely similar does not count.)
• It has the performer's date of birth on it. (If you cannot subtract 18 from the current year to figure out whether or not the performer is legal, you might ask one of the camera people. They have to learn f-stops and complicated stuff like that.)

In case you are still a bit confused, let's be clear that a ripped-apart Social Security card and a check-cashing card are not valid ID. Thank you for your cooperation in keeping us all out of jail.

The Aneros

We're often asked (often by people who call us because sex-chat lines cost money, so they thought they'd try us) "What's your most popular toy?"

Right now, it's The Aneros. As I have often said, you can never go wrong by developing new things for straight men to stick up their butts.

Alabama Views the 20th Century, Runs in Terror

The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld Alabama’s 1998 (yes, that is right, 1998, not 1898) law banning the sale of “any device designed or marketed as useful primarily for the stimulation of human genital organs for any thing of pecuniary value.”

To quote Boing Boing paraphrasing Andrew Orlowski on the moronic INDUCE Act, one could set up a shop in Alabama selling semiautomatic rifles and dildos, and be arrested for selling the dildos.

It’s time for Blowfish to offer a discount to Alabama customers, clearly.

Larry Sultan: The Valley

So, why does The XXX Project bug me, and Larry Sultan’s work doesn’t? It’s a good question: they are both mainstream photographers who have ventured, like Victorian explorers, into the heart of the porn industry, and returned to tell the tale.

Part of it is that I just admire Sultan’s work, technically: damn, I wish I could light sets like he does. Part of it is while they are both playing amateur anthropologist, Sultan does not condescend as if the porn industry was a tribe of rare monkies. “This is the first time these Porn People have ever seen a Real Photographer. Let’s watch their interesting rites as they explore the shiny objects we present them with.”

For certain mainstream entertainment types who decide to check out the porn world, they make the ironic distance clear. They may be in the porn world, but they are certainly not of it. They want the reflected glamour of the porn world without acquiring the bottom-caste air that clings to those who actually work in it.

I don’t get that from Sultan’s work; it just seem friendly, not patronizing. (If you’re in San Francisco before 1 August, check it out at SF MOMA.)

Naked Porn Stars!

Perhaps I am just confused. I am sure that Timothy Greenfield-Sanders is a fine photographer. It is clearly true that he can correctly expose film. But can someone tell me why taking 30 pictures of porn stars, whose entire job it is to pose naked for photographers, is being treated as if Vermeer had returned to Earth, complete with HBO special and a gallery show in New York?

I mean, is calling a book of porn star images The XXX Project pretentious or what? I’m sure that legions of photographers are saying, “Naked pictures of Jenna Jameson and Nina Hartley? I have thousands of them! Why does he get a show?”

Oh, well. Jenna Jameson looks quite striking without porn star makeup.

Fishnet

Yet another project of mine has gone live: Fishnet is Blowfish’s revived e-zine for erotica. The design is mine, and one of the Blowfish staff is the editor. Check it out!

What I Learned on My Porn Shoot

Last week, I directed my first porn film. It was a complete blast; I had a great time. I also did a bunch of things that . . . well, things I would have done differently.

For the benefit of any porn directors out there, here are the things I made notes of.

• Everything takes longer than you think — Talent will show up late. The food will arrive right in the middle of a scene, and you‘ll have to cut because it is on your credit card. Talent will take time getting hard. Your brilliant lighting design won‘t work in the space, and you‘ll have to move the lights around to get it right. Talent will get extremely goofy right in the middle of a scene, and you‘ll need to get them to settle down.
• Unscripted sex needs to be scripted — Or, at least, directed. The way most people have sex is not the least bit photogenic: they call it the “beast with two backs” for a reason. Even for a sex scene that is intended to be very natural, be sure you understand that it is a lot of work to get something to look natural. Just pointing a camera at talent and asking them to go for it results in a fleshy blob bouncing around for a few minutes.
• Don’t order pizza — (OK, I didn’t make this mistake, but it bears repeating.) Order food that is light, high-carb, and very low-grease. Your talent, especially the female talent, will thank you.
• Watch her lips and hair — Makeup and hair styles get messed up completely within a few seconds of the start of romping. Make sure you keep track of them, so you can stop and have the talent retouch as required.
• Don’t be afraid to do multiple takes — It is always better to get too much footage than too little. Get a nice, long shot of each position and activity, so you have a lot to work with in the editing room.
• Stop for stills — Between shots, stop shooting video and take a bunch of stills, using flash. You cannot take good stills with typical video lighting, and an on-camera flash going off during shooting is distracting for the talent and looks dopey on the footage.

Would I do it again? In a heartbeat . . . once I get this huge pile of tape edited.

Supremes Decide We Can Live Another Day

By the slimmest of margins (5-4), the Supreme Court sent the rancid Child On-line Protection Act (COPA) back to a lower court, and continued the injunction against it.

This is a victory, but not a huge one; the lower court can still decide that the law is fine as written, and back to the Supremes we go . . . And we cannot guarantee a good result, then.

Why is this such a problem? Why would anyone not want to protect children? (After years doing this, anytime someone talks about protecting children, I immediately get extremely suspicious.) Because it is not the function of the government to create a world in which parents do not need to exercise their discretion about their children‘s behavior. Besides being sops to an ultra-conservative base, the only function these laws have is to create the illusion (never the reality) that children can surf the web with no parental intervention.

The web being international also does create a small problem for the enforcement of such a law. Of course, all of those Russian porn sites will be sure to comply with a US law, even though ignoring it will give them a competitive advantage.

Jenna Jameson Gets All Lessig On Us

Now, this is a confluence of interests. The sex business and patent activism, two of my favorite subjects, in one topic!

Jenna Jameson, famous porn star, has lent moral support to the fight against yet another spurious technology patent, this one by one Acacia Research that claims to cover pretty much all streaming media.

(Of course, Jenna is a savvy businesswoman and nobody’s fool . . . her site has plenty of streaming content on it, too.)

As usual, the depth of the patent holders commitment is shown in that they are going after adult industry sites, rather than, say, Apple, Microsoft, or Real, the companies that actually build the technology. Of course, Apple and Microsoft have enormous cash mountains and battalions of lawyers to fight just such absurd suits . . . I detect some traditional playground bully behavior here on the part of Acacia.

Of course, this “bet the company on a highly dubious IP claim” strategy is hardly unique to Acacia. Just like in that case, the hope is that you score easy victories against soft targets who can’t afford a long patent fight, hoping that you can build up enough bad case law and cash so that you can then either go after the big boys, or have enough to retire on when the IP is found to be bogus and the music stops.

What we need is a wholesale revision of intellectual property law. Until then, it’s just going to be one of these stupid cases after another.

The “Ueberpimp”

Jamais sent me a reference to this wonderful article from A Fistful of Euros, which definitely takes the best blog title this week award. In summary, it appears that the German government may be in the situation of having to offer vocational training to prostitutes. But, really, read the article.

NYT: “Sex Videos on Pause, and Idled Actors Fret”

Reuters

The New York Times has run a very good article about the current HIV incident.

Smut Vendor Advocates Censorship! Film at 11!

I never thought I’d see the day in which I actually came down in favor of a censoring technology, but . . . well, I have. With, of course, some conditions.

As Mark Morford so colorfully describes, a company called ClearPlay has a technology that will skip over words and scenes that they think might be objectionable. You set the level of bowdlerization you want, and the player takes care of the rest.

I think this is a smashing idea. Really, I do. No sarcasm at all. I would gleefully get the required coding from ClearPlay to put the maximum possible nastiness code on any DVD we produce.

And then, can we get rid of this stupid idea that it makes sense for obscenity to be a crime?

Although you’d never know it to listen to the anti-smut zealots at the Department of Justice, owning pornographic material, even material that is legally obscene, is not a crime. The Supreme Court last took up this issue in Stanley v. Georgia, 394 U.S. 557, 565 (1969), and they have never seemed interested in revisiting it. (This does not, of course, include child pornography, which is an entirely different thing, both legally and morally.)

It does seem a bit insane to have laws against the making and selling of something that is legal to own. Thus, the entire reason behind obscenity laws has to be prevent such things from falling into the hands of people who don’t want them. I’m in favor of that, too, although sending people to Federal prison for a number of years seems like a pretty heavy-handed way of controlling a distribution channel problem. So, let’s bring our smarts and our technology to the problem: Have a DVD player that has a “no-porn” bit, have a bit on the DVD that says, “this is porn!&rdquo, and (now we get to the wishful-thinking part of our entertainment) have that be an affirmative defense against obscenity charges.

People who want to watch porn, can watch porn. People who make porn for a living, can make porn. People who don’t want to watch porn will have the disk spat back out into their lap, just in case they thought Reaming & Screaming: Boss Bitches #17 was kid-friendly. (Take my word for it, those people exist.) Problem solved!

After all, this anti-porn crusade is just an attempt to make sure that people who don’t want to watch porn don’t have to, right? It certainly can’t be yet another assault on the First Amendment or blatant election-era pandering to a hard-right base, or anything so stupid as that? Thought not.

Porn and Privacy

The ever-interesting Fleshbot has some links on the subject of Porn and Privacy . . . In particular, the question has been raised of whether publishing the names of the first and second generation of exposed actors in the latest HIV rumpus violated their privacy.

I’m going to avoid talking about the legal aspects of it, as I’m not really up on the statutes in question. Just on the basis of the ethics of the situation, did AIM do the right thing by publishing the list?

Yes, they did, and to say otherwise reflects (at best) a naïveté about what this industry is really like.

For every Nina Hartley in porn, there are a dozen girls (and guys) who are not making very good decisions about their lives. Porn still very much has the underground, travelling-show, gypsies-tramps-and-thieves thing going on. Actors arrive and leave with amazing speed. Laura Roxx, the second confirmed HIV-positive performer, flew into town to make some quick bucks and was planning to fly out again.

Relying on agents, friends, producers and the like to get the word out wouldn’t do it. When Laura Roxx arrived in town, she was told that the only shoot she could get on required a double-anal, when she’d never done anal before. Oh, really? In the entire San Fernando Valley, the only porn shoot was doing just one scene that required a double anal? Bullshit. Whoever told her that was having trouble getting a girl to do a double anal, and leaned on her.

Do you think that person would have tracked her down to tell her that she had been exposed? He would have probably whined that he would have, but he didn’t have her number, and anyway she lives all the way up in Canada and that’s an international call.

Many people in the adult industry truly care and truly do look after each other. But counting on those people is not enough when something like a potential HIV outbreak is involved. Although I can understand the point that having one’s real or potential HIV status splashed across a public web page is not anyone’s idea of a good time, maximum publicity is the only sane way to respond to this.

iPorn

I thought this was a brilliant idea. After all, isn’t porn the killer app of the web?

Then I realized it was a satire. Mentioning Peter North should have been a give-away; he’s so 1998.

But then again, life frequently imitates satire.

The Plague Years

In case you haven’t heard about it by now, the porn industry is in the grip of an HIV crisis. The short form is that a male actor, Darren James, tested postiive for HIV antibodies around April 12th. He had tested negative on March 17th. Since the standard test used for HIV in the industry can take up to 60 days to be 99% accurate, and quite a bit of porn production happens without condoms, anyone he worked with from January 17th onwards could have been exposed to HIV, and thus could contract it.

Most of the major porn production houses have halted production. The performers who worked with James in that period (the “first generation”) and anyone who worked with them (the “second generation”) and so forth are being sought so they can be tested. The date currently being thrown around for restarting production is June 8th, 60 days after James last worked.

But, you ask, isn’t this kind of thing just to be expected in the industry?

It doesn’t have to be.

The adult movie industry went through a period of tremendous denial about HIV, lasting until the early to mid 90’s. Then, in the wake of several high-profile HIV-positive performers, the industry did, in fact, clean up its act. Mandatory HIV tests became de rigeur. AIM, a not-for-profit testing facility, was set up. Without an HIV test less than 30 days old, you just didn’t work.

Amazingly, this self-policing has kept HIV from tearing through the performers. The last confirmed case of HIV in an active performer in the mainstream adult industry was in 1999, four years ago. The fact that many of the major production houses have condom-mandatory policies helped a great deal, too.

That being said, the industry still has its head in the sand (or, more accurately perhaps, up its collective ass) about STDs in general, and HIV in particular. Far too many production companies are condoms-optional, or in some particularly stupid cases, bareback-mandatory. The usual sets of whines accompany any call for mandatory condom use: “It’s not required, the customers won’t buy it, it’s an overreaction, etc., etc.” The time for that kind of mendacious crap is over, done, gone. A production house owner would have to be less than human to look in the eye one of the women who are in James’ first generation of exposure, especially any that turn out to be positive, and repeat that garbage.

The captains of the industry likes to spout the rhetoric of caring for the talent; it’s time to put up, or shut up and admit that they really just think of the talent as one more disposable prop. I have no doubt whatsoever that’s exactly what many of them do think.

This latest crisis comes at a particularly bad time. The DoJ, after a few years of slumber, is finally waking up and starting the prosecution machine. Los Angeles, the homeland of the business, is getting very impatient with it. If the industry does not adopt a strict condom-mandatory policy, the government will do it for it. Is that what it really wants?

Self-policing has worked well, but not well enough. Mandatory condom use is an idea whose time is far overdue. If the captains of the industry are not smart enough to see that, the government will be more than happy to educate them.

FTC Bans Meanness

Oh, yeah, that will work.

On my way to work, I pass the San Francisco Mission police station. Shortly after 9/11 (I’d guess; I wasn’t in the country then), the curbs to either side of it were painted off as “No Stopping Any Time” zones. This was a brilliant idea: suicide car bombers are always deterred by traffic regulations. (“Curses, our plot against the decadent West is foiled! The enemy has learned that we never double park!”)

Spam is a huge problem, and I have no sympathy whatsoever for cretins who send bulk unsolicited email of any kind, sexually-explicit or no. But the thing that the FTC seems to be missing (or, more than likely, wilfully ignoring) is that these people have already demonstrated that they have no problem whatsoever with breaking the law. I will be astonished if even one prosecution results from this new little tidbit.

The only companies that will obey the new regulation are honest, ethical companies that wouldn’t spam anyway, since they have reputations to lose, and don’t try to hide. The really bad people will just ignore it, and will then have yet another competitive advantage. Brilliant move, guys; thanks for promoting honest commerce.

No magic cure for spam exists, but one thing that would help tremendously is contained in four little words: “Right of private action.” But that’s a different post’s topic.

Basta le Barbie

The story of the Russian girl who won an on-line beauty contest despite not being the typical beauty queen type is utterly heart-warming. Even though I deal in a business that is sadly addicted to Barbie-types, often with tragic results, it is wonderful to see blows being struck against that being the only standard of female beauty.

Along those lines, I keep meaning to use this image somewhere; it being horizontal format makes it a bit harder to find a good use of it, but I love it none the less.

A9 knows what's good for you

Amazon has pulled the wraps off of their new search service, A9. It's built on top of Google, but is enhanced in a variety of ways. John Battelle has written a good article about it.

But what is interesting about it to me is that it apparently has "Safe Search" turned on . . . with no obvious way to turn it off. It doesn't use your Google preferences. Signing in doesn't provide an obvious way of setting your level of safety. Is lowest-common-denominator search the wave of the future?

(Via Boing Boing.)

Am I felonious or not?

Via the rather righty Little Miss Attila, found this article (from another righty blog) questioning the wisdom about the War on Pornography.

I’m not going to hash over (in this post) the idea of whether or not a War on a Concept is a reasonable idea. I'm going to address one of the comments, which rhetorically asks:

So you think we shouldn’t enforce the law because we are fighting terrorism?

In the case of the War on Pornography, it’s not that simple.

In a reasonable world, any average citizen should be able to tell, in advance, if a particular action will break the law or not. For example, whether or not you agree with the War on Drugs, if you are bouncing ashore north of San Diego with a motorboat full of cocaine, it’s hard to argue that you didn't know that you were doing something the law frowns upon.

The problem with the current state of obscenity law (and, please remember, the term "pornography" has no legal definition whatsoever) is that you don’t know. You will never know. The only way to know is to be prosecuted, have your life ruined by the expense and effort of defending yourself, be found innocent . . . and then have to do it all over again with the next book or video you make.

Suppose the only way you could know if taking a prescription drug was legal was to be busted, have all your assets seized, be prosecuted, and then be found innocent. And further suppose that no precedent whatsoever would be established by this: You could still be prosecuted for taking a different medication, and your neighbor down the street could be prosecuted for the same drug that you were just acquitted for.

Welcome to the state of modern obscenity law. It’s not a comfortable place to live. Saying that the government should "just enforce the law" conceals a huge amount of politicized decision-making as to who gets prosecuted, and for what. It's been somewhat academic until recently, as the Clinton administration did not consider obscenity prosecutions a priority, and the Bush administration had, shall we say, other things to think about. But now the Feds have a case that they are sure they can win, and they are probably right.

As with most people in the sex business, I view the prosecution of Extreme Associates with mixed feelings. Rob Black’s (of Extreme) protestations of innocence are utterly disingenuous; this is a guy who has made a living by deliberately pushing the edge, with material that everyone with half a living brain cell knew was prosecution bait. That was his marketing niche: He made videos with shit (sometimes literally) in them that other producers wouldn't touch. If you dance on the edge of the cliff yelling, "Look how close I am!", when you trip and fall, it’s a bit rich to claim you were pushed. It’s doubly rich to take up a collection for your medical bills.

But my peers in the industry have rocks in their head if they think the Extreme Associates prosecution is the end. It's the beginning. The Ashcroft DoJ wants a case they can win, to prove to the public, the sex industry, the demoralized anti-smut zealots within the DoJ, and (most importantly) the Bush administration’s extreme right-wing base that obscenity cases are winnable. If that can be accomplished, hunting season will be open, and we’ll all be in front of the blind.

(Thanks to Jamais for the idea of a War on Concept, btw.)

The Girls of April

We decided (well, OK, I decided) to run advertisements in Girlfriends and On Our Backs, since they are having anniversary issues and all. Unfortunately, the only images of two women that we had in our files were way too hot for Girlfriends, so a photo shoot was in order. After a few hasty emails and telephone calls, I got a couple of my favorite models to appear on late notice.

It's always wonderful to work with professionals. Thanks to both of them for the great results. (I'll do a proper gallery once a few more are scanned.)

The Face of Evil

One of our vendors sent this picture to me this morning, and I was inexplicably charmed by it. Not work safe . . . but then again, what is, anymore?

Banned in Bentonville, 2

This is the image that we sent to them instead. How precisely this one is not "showing people having sex" compared to the other is one of those Talmudic questions that only publishers are able to decide.

Banned in Bentonville

I suppose I should take some pleasure in producing an image that was too racy for Mens Edge magazine to use. They say it was because they were just picked up by WalMart. Anything's possible, I suppose, although I notice that they didn't complain about the picture and description of the Aneros that accompanied the ad we sent in.