What technology has porn driven recently?
 

I just got interviewed by a UK magazine about porn and filesharing etc and the impact it has had on our industry. One question they asked was that people always said porn was the cutting edge of technology. Multiangle DVDs, interactive CDs, streaming online video, etc.

He then asked what have 'we' done lately?

And I couldn't think of anything apart from Real Touch, which hasn't seemed to have been that much of a success...

Is anyone actually innovating?

the idea that porn was the driving force of tech was always a myth. it was promoted by geeks and geeky tech journalists to make a nerdy lifestyle seem sexy.

How about an extremely sophisticated interactive video sex game? I'm sure there'll be a lot to talk about in Amsterdam in a couple of days.

Fraudulent abuse of credit cards on epic levels.

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plastic bags on porn mags. creepy touching photographers.

Yes. We are. We are still testing and tweaking, but always innovating. Our newest, more stable at home machines will be online soon as well as some amazing features that will make you say "wow!" :thumbsup

cross billing and card jacking. high end stuff.

Yeah, I spoke in some detail about that.

Sadly.

Xsales....

USB pussy? :=))

I agree. Streaming video was always the example I heard, but the only reason porn started using it first (to any extent) is because nobody but the horny would have put up with the absolutely abysmal quality it had. IOW it was totally unusable for anything else/worthwhile.

As for webcams, is there a genuine (interesting) non-porn use for them even today?

I do however believe that porn, especially when the media got hysterical about it, kickstarted the net by encouraging a lot of people (aka men) to get online.

But that was free porn. :)

I am not sure that we led the tech revolution in anyway - What we are good at is recognising marketing oportunities and developing them.

you should have told the interviewer to call Paul Markham..

he's much more knowledgeable than you...

his innovations alone, like magic join forms, have really shaped the industry in the last few years... :thumbsup






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None. I wrote an article for XBiz about 5 years back saying that the mainstream market has been watching the adult market (information my clients like ABC and ESPN had told me) and that they where learning how to do it better. Almost like, "Nice try and we commend your efforts, now it's our turn". I knew the day would come where the mainstream market would take over in the area of innovation and the use of technologies.

Mobile is a great example. Adult tried to get into this market early though mainstream providers in the EU where doing it 10 years ago. I represented CCBill at a conference in Paris where I was the only one there that had anything to do with adult but every media outlet in the EU was there.

Adult could not figure out how to monetize mobile content where mainstream adapted quickly making it a branding and advertising tool. Who was the first tube site? We all know that one as they coined the word Tube and it was far from adult.

10 year back 85% of all online revenues where generated from adult. Today, it's around 15%. Adult hasn't died, it's just that mainstream is now competing for those same dollars and anyone who thinks that there is no competition between dollars spent for porn versus dollars spent elsewhere are sorely mistaken and more than likely those here on this board complaining about their numbers.

Look at the biggest players in adult today and you see, how they conduct business, how they host and delivery content and realize that everything they do, are the same processes being used by Mainstream. CDN is a good example. Adult still thinks it's just a faster type of bandwidth when in fact, there is not a major mainstream media company online without it.

In the end, the best practices are being presented by mainstream now where it was once adult. My advice is to watch what they do, don't think we in adult are still the innovators and suck it up while you try to emulate their practices.

Adult is no longer the leaders in developing new ideas and technologies however this is not a competition of who is more brilliant, its about competition for revenues.

on serious note, the advertising pop up.

I can tell you what technology has driven porn into the ground...

Giving it away to sell something else.

Popup is adult invention, yes, mainstream perfected it and we then took what they did.

Randall, I agree with many things, but I also think that even recently adult has helped greatly to shape bandwidth. A lot of bandwidth today is from mainstream, yes, but we know for a fact that we (Manwin) are somewhere in the Top 5 users of bandwidth worldwide, and thus we are helping the internet community a great deal in slashing those prices.

I think we are in a position today, just like with many other technologies in the past, where adult entertainment has done its share to promote the technology but has now given it to mainstream to rule it. This happened with video (vhs) for example, and it happened with the internet.

That does not change the fact that adult entertainment helps shape the use of technology.

The internet has been taken over by mainstream, and adult entertainment will have to wait for the next innovation to step in and help it grow.

That's a good point actually, we did invent Freemium.

Let's not forget, youtube might have been the first tube site. But adult entertainment companies were the first to make money off a site like that.

Ironically Nathan, you where one of the companies that I was referring to that gets it and are in fact utilizing every resource available to optimize your offerings. I know how much you guys push and yes, it has helped affect the cost of bandwidth. Your company is a big part of why I can now offer the prices I can offer.

One point that I do think gets missed is the volume of companies like Netflix who do about 10 times the volume of the largest in adult that are also followed by companies who you would never think of as really in the game including Activision (WoW) Linden Labs (Second Life) and of course Amazon, YouTube, FaceBook, MySpace and others. Many are also delivering broadcast tv now over the internet and not to your PC but to your web enabled BlueRay and Monitors.

Do you have Netflix gbps numbers? I'm curious. I know we have a report somewhere, but still wondering... and yeah, I know they are huge, its insane.

"Many consider the first weblog to be created by someone with the moniker 'The Pervinator' (real identity unknown) who had a daily updated website called 'The Pervinators Porn Links' where he posted his favorite porn links from around the web as well as detailing his increasingly elaborate experiments with auto-felliation."

Dan Perkins, A Short History of Weblogs.

technology? none that I know of. If we call a js function (a pop up) a "technology development" then yeah, we have something, but in general adult is 2-3 years behind of mainstream

if this
was created / developed /enhanced or whatever by adult industry, then it's all news for me, guess I was somewhere else these last 14 years :Oh crap

if in doubt, just try this: first think of a really original idea, even if already done in mainstream, something not very extended. Now offer it to any big adult company and see how many of them will be interested in developing them, then tell us :2 cents:

Nonsense.

:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh

sorry, didn't see this post before. I mean, I know your company did a lot of great stuff and is hands down the leader in technology in the industry, but are you really saying you invented a concept that existed even before Internet (just not with that name)? just FYI, the entire online adult industry is based in that model since its conception :2 cents:

Cool stuff, keep it coming!

HD-DVD. Boy! Porn threw in with the wrong tech there.

porn technology innovation peaked with jquery and ajax...

Netflix is actually now one of the top 20 sites on the net.