It is hardly surprising that the seediest sector of the Internet community has become a pioneering force in driving the world online. It is not, after all, the first time the sex industry has eagerly embraced and exploited a new medium for fulsome commercial gain.
As well as enabling the publication of Guttenberg's bible, moving type brought forward a flurry of pornographic pamphlets for the delectation of an educated minority. Later, photographs (first black-and-white, later developing into full colour), then video cassettes, became the mainstays of porn merchants, and they now appear to have lost their place to the Internet.
From streaming video to chat-rooms, web-cams to video-conferencing, and javascript programming to slack-jaw stupid spam, many of the more enduring recent technological advances - positive and negative - have debuted in the virtually dank surrounds of online porn, before moving into the mainstream. While most web-based endeavours continue to lose money at an alarming rate, the maxim that sex sells continues to be borne out online. It remains difficult to find a reliable guide to the number of people who habitually seek adult-oriented material, but given the 40,000 sites catering to the market, and the cost of building them - between $20,000 and $40,000 - it is clear money is being spent. And made.
With this backing, X-rated web developers are well equipped to work new technology into their products. Camera and data-processing software enabling full-circle digital video to be streamed is readily available, while smell technology, which is as its name suggests, is slowly establishing an online presence. Increasingly, Macromedia's Flash is being relied upon to build entire sites, and chat software enables porn site builders to add what they would describe as "intimacy" to their wares.
Then there is the relentless stream of misleading and thoroughly dishonest email sent via shell accounts each day in an effort to lure people into sites of dubious virtue and, once there, trap them with Javascript.
Effectively deployed, Javascript prevents users exiting a given site without first opening up a new browser window containing virtually identical material. This process is repeated ad nauseam generating additional page impressions for the host site, not to mention potential advertising revenue in a manner which is utterly disingenuous and dishonest. But then, given the industry that's in it, that hardly comes as much of a surprise.
