Showing posts with label Porn. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Porn. Show all posts
Monday, January 30, 2012
Real Estate Porn
Castle Rogue's Manor
http://realestate.yahoo.com/promo/an-american-castle-in-the-ozarks.html
If you're in the mood for an opulent and unique home, but a $12 million private island isn't your style, then Castle Rogue's Manor might be right up your medieval alley. Located overlooking White River in Eureka Springs, Ark., this 15,000 square-foot castle sports 12 bedrooms, 13 bathrooms, 17 acres of land, and a $1.8 million price-tag. It is also a castle, just like the name implies.
The property was once a mere house sitting on 20 acres of land, but according to the original builder, the site overlooking White River "just screamed for a castle." Now Castle Rogue's Manor, anchored at the top of a 100' limestone bluff, enjoys a 360-degree view over the surrounding Ozark scenery as well as the nearby river, lake, and town of Beaver.
If that $1.8 million price-tag sounds huge, just remember Castle Rogue's Manor contains 15,000 square feet. That's just $120 per square foot — a pretty reasonable price for a property like this one — even without considering the 17 acres of land and unmistakeable medieval flare. This just happens to be a really, really big home that is also a castle.
The fantasy fortress is mindblowingly beautiful with its Gatekeeper's Cottage, Paisley Hall, two guard towers, and other structures all built in medieval style. Nearly all of the castle's details have been hand-crafted, but the work on Castle Rogue's Manor was so daunting that four out of the nine roofers hired to apply the cottage's original shingles left as soon as they laid eyes on the place. The entire castle is a piece of art, ready to house any kind of resort, museum, or getaway.
The interior paneling is made from black walnut and cedar logs which were created from trees on the property itself. The castle's basement was used as a woodshop for seasoning and crafting the local wood. The Gatekeeper's Cottage was built first as a prototype for the great hall, and the fireplace in the great hall is 9' wide and 5' high, put together with over three tons of rock. Two other fireplaces (and tubing in the foundation of Paisley Hall) in the home help keep the chill away during the Ozark winters.
The cottage and great hall shows off post-and-beam construction, steel beams, and various ornamental ironwork. Since the castle was built with local lumber, the overall design is meant to convey a reverence for wood. Despite the medieval flair, Castle Rogue's Manor is wired for modern conveniences, including a computer network and even a central vacuum system. Of course, like any luxury home, the castle boasts a complete kitchen, air conditioning, clothes washer and dryer, and other staples of modern living.
If you have the $1.8 million — and a desire to buy a home in Arkansas — it would be hard to go wrong with the amazing Castle Rogue's Manor. It's a handcrafted piece of a beauty with some colorful history already under its soaring architecture. That much square footage and acreage have plenty of uses and you wont find any home more unique than this visionary palace. Since the Gatekeeper's Cottage is a separate building, you could even consider it an in-law suite, and keep the main castle to yourself!
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Inside A $1.5 Million Cave House
Full Article:
http://realestate.yahoo.com/promo/inside-a-15-million-cave-house.html
Locals refer to it as the Cave House and the nickname is apt. Sitting on 37 acres just outside of Bisbee, AZ, a mining town-turned-Baby Boomer retirement haven about 80 miles from Tucson, the Chulo Canyon Cave House is carved into an outcropping of granite boulder, extending more than 2,000-square feet into a desert grotto.
The strange and unusual dwelling is up for grabs and could be yours for $1.5 million. It occupies 2,890-square feet of living space and comes with a 890-square foot guest house, a subterranean game room underneath the guest house, a library building, a stand-alone workshop space, a separate home office, and a carport. The main house features rough petrous walls, rock and cement ceilings, and potable wall water seep that is collected from a natural spring. There’s a glass-walled sunroom, a commercial-grade kitchen with stained glass cabinets and mosaic tiling, an-eight person dining room, a sunken living room, two full bathrooms, a sleep loft with walk-in closet tucked below underneath the loft stairs, and a back room that is currently used as an exercise and yoga room.
The desert abode was built by the current owner, specifically the current owner’s late husband who recently passed away. “It’s technically a man made cave that was actually blasted out of the rock existing there,” explains Jean Noreen, a Realtor with Bisbee Realty and the listing agent for the Cave House. ”But it has all of the good qualities of a cave for living like it stays the same temperature all year round.” Maintaining a so-called ‘rock temperature,’ the house never slides below 66 degrees Fahrenheit or above 72 degrees.
Creating this man-made cavern home meant recruiting a mining engineer who, using the Swedish straight wall mining technique, injected the ceilings with roof bolts and excavated blasted rock with ammonium nitrate.
But as attention-grabbing as the stone-forged main lair is, the property’s zaniness doesn’t end there. Starting with the pools, which are not your typical chlorinated in-grounds. Rather, the home’s natural pools are a short hike away, up the side of a nearby mountain and fed by a freshwater creek for six to eight months out of the year. The higher up the mountain you climb the more pools you have to choose from. The owners also installed a carefully camouflaged hot tub...
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A little bit of Dodge City in Junior's back yard
David Caraviello, NASCAR.COM
January 22, 2012
Full Article:
http://www.nascar.com/news/120122/dearnhardtjr-western-town
There's a barbershop that advertises haircuts for a quarter, a jail with real locking cells, and a church with a steeple. There's a post office, a bank, and a hotel with bunk beds in the rooms upstairs. There's the Blazin Saddles Tack Shop and the Silverado Saloon, the latter of which features a pool table and genuine bottles of booze behind the long, polished bar.
Welcome to Whisky River, a Western town that seems so authentic, you almost expect to see Matt Dillon, Seth Bullock or Josey Wales tromping down the muddy thoroughfare that runs through the middle. On this day, it's playing host to the filming of a shoot-'em-up commercial for this year's Sprint All-Star Race at Charlotte Motor Speedway. But this is no movie set -- this is Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s private fantasyland, a little piece of Dodge City or Deadwood built on his 200 acres of property north of Charlotte.
"Dale Jr.'s a real low-key guy, and likes to have fun with his friends, and this is definitely the place for that," said Paul Menard, one of four active drivers involved in the commercial shoot, and a former teammate of Earnhardt's at Dale Earnhardt Inc. "It's got a little history. It's a cool place."
The idea stemmed from practicality. The bar in the basement of Earnhardt's former house near DEI -- the once-famous Club E, which was featured on MTV's Cribs program -- began to be more trouble than it was worth. "I was thinking, man, I want to have something I can have parties at, and not worry that I'm tearing my house apart," Earnhardt said. Online, he found someone who would build 1,000-square-foot tree houses, and toyed with that idea until his sister, Kelley, warned him that he'd probably fall out.
Then one day Earnhardt was watching a rerun of 60 Minutes which featured a segment on country-singer Willie Nelson, who had bought property in Texas that contained an Old West movie set. The set had originally been only building fronts, but Nelson finished the structures and made them usable. Earnhardt loved the idea and set about building his own Western village from scratch, hiring out-of-work carpenters to do the construction, and -- befitting a driver with a flair for a nostalgic -- using wood from Kannapolis' old Cannon Mills, which once stood near where the statue of Earnhardt's father is today.
"We drew it on a sheet of paper and built it on cinder blocks," Earnhardt said at the NASCAR Hall of Fame in Charlotte, where he took part in the Preview '12 fan event held Saturday. "It got bigger and bigger."
For a first-time visitor, the reality is somewhat staggering. There are saddles and wagon wheels and rocking chairs, hitching posts and barrels and upstairs balconies, stagecoaches and lanterns and animal skulls. Climb on up to the second floor of a hotel called the Hilton, where there are three rooms with bunk beds inside. Head on over to the livery, where there are tools for leatherworking and changing horseshoes. Watch out for the jail, where there are two cells that can be padlocked shut, and a gallows outside for more unfortunate criminals. Belly up to the Silverado Saloon, where there's a piano and a full bar and all manner of animal heads, hides and skulls on the walls.
For Charlotte Motor Speedway, it was the perfect place to film an All-Star Race commercial featuring Menard, Carl Edwards, Tony Stewart and Mark Martin as double-crossing poker players, who end the ensuing argument with six-shooters drawn. Earnhardt has also used Whisky River for projects filmed by his own production company, Hammerhead, as well as for things like birthday parties and Halloween hayrides for family members and friends. For a driver with a definite appreciation for history who has always liked Clint Eastwood's spaghetti Westerns, it seems a natural extension of himself.
"More than anything, I think it helps people see the personality in me," said Earnhardt, who built Whisky River about six years ago. "Because that's important for me, that people know me, get to know me, and understand me. ... That's kind of like looking through someone's record collection. It kind of shows you a little bit about them."
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
Saturday, March 12, 2011
Book Review of the Week
“Sorry ladies. In the age of PlayStation 3s, 24-hours-a-day sports channels, and free Internet porn, you are now obsolete. All that nagging, whining, and stealing our hard earned cash have finally caught up to you."
One man's rightful dismissal of Manning Up: How the Rise of Women Has Turned Men Into Boys, the shrill new book by Kay Hymowitz
One man's rightful dismissal of Manning Up: How the Rise of Women Has Turned Men Into Boys, the shrill new book by Kay Hymowitz
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Porn: The Illuminati Plot
Henry Makow is an interesting, if controversial, guy. The creator of the popular home game Scruples, he now runs the Website SaveTheMales.ca, which is dedicated to his hobby horses: in particular, warning the promotion of feminism, homosexuality and pornography is part of an Illuminati plot to destroy Western civilization. That he links this diabolical conspiracy to the Protocols of Zion would make him an easy target as anti-Semite, if it wasn't for the fact he's a descendant of Nazi Holocaust survivors. In any case, Makow is often dismissed as an anti-woman, anti-gay moral prude, and though the truth is a bit more nuanced than that, these reductions of his writings are not made out of thin air. Furthermore, whatever his own particular views may be, his work is popular among rabid anti-Semites, white supremacists and extreme right-wing Christians that all endorse a very ugly, reactionary politic agenda. If you judge a tree by their fruits, Makow would be a good tree to avoid at all costs.
It would then be real easy for me dismiss Makow and his works as the paranoid scribblings of a man suffering a major persecution complex that any Freudian could write a thesis over. It would be easy to dismiss him, but unfortunately, I can't, even if I don't share the same philosophy as he does. The reason I can't dismiss him is that his writings prove to be way too stunningly accurate.
Take a recent piece by him on the effects of pornography on Japanese society. In Japan, porn is far more prevalent and depraved than it is in the USA, and the results aren't pretty:
"Normally teenage boys are obsessed with sex. So you know something is very wrong when more than a third of Japanese youths say they don't want it!
According to a government survey, 35 per cent of Japanese males aged 16-19 are averse to sex, more than double the 17.5 percent of men in the previous study in 2008."
This little stat underscores one of his main points: that American society's obsession with sex is paradoxically anti-sexual in nature. Seeing what happens in a trailblazer nation on porn such as Japan is a sign of things to come. As Makow states:
"Pornography is a sexual turn-off. This is why the Illuminati have made it ubiquitous.
People get sick of whatever they have too much of. There's too much sex out there. The challenge and mystery are gone. Most males are jaded. They look at porn to see if there is any woman left who can turn them on.
Porn makes available women seem inadequate. It becomes a substitute for sex with a real woman."
Let it be noted that I am strongly in favor of free speech extended to pornography. I am also someone who doesn't hide his appreciation of porn. That said, I have to admit that everything Makow says in the paragraphs above is completely true. And I doubt any friends of mine who are porn appreciators would disagree with me on this.
I'm sure I haven't done Makow justice here, and a writer this unusual can't be given justice in such small of space. So instead let me recommend you his work at SaveTheMales.ca and HenryMakow.com where, even if if you don't completely embrace his premises, you may learn something from his often controversial writings.
Is Porn Killing Sex in Japan?
January 14, 2011
Henry Makow
http://www.henrymakow.com/is_porn_killing_sex.html
It would then be real easy for me dismiss Makow and his works as the paranoid scribblings of a man suffering a major persecution complex that any Freudian could write a thesis over. It would be easy to dismiss him, but unfortunately, I can't, even if I don't share the same philosophy as he does. The reason I can't dismiss him is that his writings prove to be way too stunningly accurate.
Take a recent piece by him on the effects of pornography on Japanese society. In Japan, porn is far more prevalent and depraved than it is in the USA, and the results aren't pretty:
"Normally teenage boys are obsessed with sex. So you know something is very wrong when more than a third of Japanese youths say they don't want it!
According to a government survey, 35 per cent of Japanese males aged 16-19 are averse to sex, more than double the 17.5 percent of men in the previous study in 2008."
This little stat underscores one of his main points: that American society's obsession with sex is paradoxically anti-sexual in nature. Seeing what happens in a trailblazer nation on porn such as Japan is a sign of things to come. As Makow states:
"Pornography is a sexual turn-off. This is why the Illuminati have made it ubiquitous.
People get sick of whatever they have too much of. There's too much sex out there. The challenge and mystery are gone. Most males are jaded. They look at porn to see if there is any woman left who can turn them on.
Porn makes available women seem inadequate. It becomes a substitute for sex with a real woman."
Let it be noted that I am strongly in favor of free speech extended to pornography. I am also someone who doesn't hide his appreciation of porn. That said, I have to admit that everything Makow says in the paragraphs above is completely true. And I doubt any friends of mine who are porn appreciators would disagree with me on this.
I'm sure I haven't done Makow justice here, and a writer this unusual can't be given justice in such small of space. So instead let me recommend you his work at SaveTheMales.ca and HenryMakow.com where, even if if you don't completely embrace his premises, you may learn something from his often controversial writings.
Is Porn Killing Sex in Japan?
January 14, 2011
Henry Makow
http://www.henrymakow.com/is_porn_killing_sex.html
Friday, September 24, 2010
Tyler Durden Gives Blood
http://www.aolnews.com/nation/article/teens-get-porn-shock-during-blood-bank-presentation/19630164
Teens Get Porn Shock During Blood Bank Presentation
Theunis Bates
AOL News (Sept. 12) -- More than 400 students from Norwin High School in western Pennsylvania got an unexpected eyeful Friday, when a big screen presentation on the importance of donating blood suddenly turned into an X-rated slideshow.
The hardcore images -- described by students as gay pornography, according to the Pittsburgh Post Gazette -- were stored on a portable flash drive owned by a Central Blood Bank employee. That USB stick also contained the safe-for-all-ages PowerPoint presentation. But unfortunately, the Gazette noted, when Assistant Principal Tim Kotch plugged the drive into a computer, he unwittingly clicked on the wrong file, causing several explicit photos to appear on the school's giant TV screen.
"It took a few seconds for people to process what was up there," senior Chelsey Fix told the newspaper. "People were laughing, but the main thing was people were like, 'I can't believe this happened.'" Student Ethan Dobranski told Channel 4 Action News that the images included "frontal male nudity, and there was one with, like, two people in there, but it was, like, from the back."
"That's what popped up, but I don't think [the Central Blood Bank employee] realized that was on there at the time, and he was truly embarrassed for what happened," student Dan Jones told the TV news show. "He was just shocked. He, like, put his hand on the stage and covered his head. He was so ashamed of himself for having that."
A second presentation planned for the school's junior class later that day was canceled.
Those hardcore images may have caused snickers among the students, but they look certain to result in the Central Blood Bank being hit with a seriously hefty lawsuit. "They tell me it lasted about 30 seconds, which is a long time," attorney Peter J. Payne, who has been hired by parents of several students who attended the presentation, told Channel 4. "Every parent that I've talked to is very concerned. We're still talking about the senior class, but these kids are 17, 18 years old at the most."
Sponsored Links The school district offered its "sincerest apologies" to parents in a letter, and said local police and the district attorney's office had been notified. "We find this incident inexcusable and are taking every measure we can to ensure that the investigation is carried out with the utmost fidelity," the letter read.
The Central Blood Bank also sent out a letter apologizing for the "inappropriate material" shown to students. The unnamed employee has been suspended pending an investigation. "Per organizational policy, employees are not allowed to use flash drives and are required to review their presentations in advance with their supervisor; in this situation, the employee ignored these policies," the letter said.
However, the photo scandal has at least succeeded in raising awareness of the blood bank with local teens. Senior Ethan Dobranski, 17, told The Associated Press that the photos were the No. 1 topic of conversation on Friday. "No one's ever going to forget this," he said.
Teens Get Porn Shock During Blood Bank Presentation
Theunis Bates
AOL News (Sept. 12) -- More than 400 students from Norwin High School in western Pennsylvania got an unexpected eyeful Friday, when a big screen presentation on the importance of donating blood suddenly turned into an X-rated slideshow.
The hardcore images -- described by students as gay pornography, according to the Pittsburgh Post Gazette -- were stored on a portable flash drive owned by a Central Blood Bank employee. That USB stick also contained the safe-for-all-ages PowerPoint presentation. But unfortunately, the Gazette noted, when Assistant Principal Tim Kotch plugged the drive into a computer, he unwittingly clicked on the wrong file, causing several explicit photos to appear on the school's giant TV screen.
"It took a few seconds for people to process what was up there," senior Chelsey Fix told the newspaper. "People were laughing, but the main thing was people were like, 'I can't believe this happened.'" Student Ethan Dobranski told Channel 4 Action News that the images included "frontal male nudity, and there was one with, like, two people in there, but it was, like, from the back."
"That's what popped up, but I don't think [the Central Blood Bank employee] realized that was on there at the time, and he was truly embarrassed for what happened," student Dan Jones told the TV news show. "He was just shocked. He, like, put his hand on the stage and covered his head. He was so ashamed of himself for having that."
A second presentation planned for the school's junior class later that day was canceled.
Those hardcore images may have caused snickers among the students, but they look certain to result in the Central Blood Bank being hit with a seriously hefty lawsuit. "They tell me it lasted about 30 seconds, which is a long time," attorney Peter J. Payne, who has been hired by parents of several students who attended the presentation, told Channel 4. "Every parent that I've talked to is very concerned. We're still talking about the senior class, but these kids are 17, 18 years old at the most."
Sponsored Links The school district offered its "sincerest apologies" to parents in a letter, and said local police and the district attorney's office had been notified. "We find this incident inexcusable and are taking every measure we can to ensure that the investigation is carried out with the utmost fidelity," the letter read.
The Central Blood Bank also sent out a letter apologizing for the "inappropriate material" shown to students. The unnamed employee has been suspended pending an investigation. "Per organizational policy, employees are not allowed to use flash drives and are required to review their presentations in advance with their supervisor; in this situation, the employee ignored these policies," the letter said.
However, the photo scandal has at least succeeded in raising awareness of the blood bank with local teens. Senior Ethan Dobranski, 17, told The Associated Press that the photos were the No. 1 topic of conversation on Friday. "No one's ever going to forget this," he said.
Sunday, July 25, 2010
"Buttman's" porn obscenity trial: Why it matters
http://www.salon.com/life/feature/2010/07/13/trial_of_buttman/index.html
Tuesday, Jul 13, 2010
"Buttman's" porn obscenity trial: Why it matters
John Stagliano faces jail time over his company's fetish films, but his court battle could redefine free speech
Mary Elizabeth Williams
John Stagliano, better known throughout his long career simply as "Buttman," is a pornographer. As a director and the head of Evil Angel pictures, he has given the world such classics as "Nudes A-Poppin 7" and "An American Buttman In London." He is a multiple Adult Video News Award winner, and easily one of the most recognized names in adult entertainment. And today, Stagliano is something else: a defendant. He's facing up to 32 years in prison and $7 million in fines, in the first adult porn obscenity case in Washington, D.C.'s U.S. District Court in over two decades. And you thought the fight against pornography died with 1986's Meese Report. Au contraire, smut-mongers.
Pornography has had its day in court before, notably in 1973's Miller v. California, which established the three criteria for a work to be deemed "obscene." Going beyond the old "I know it when I see it" test, Miller set the standard: that "the work depicts/describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by applicable state law"; that it, "taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value"; and for the kicker, that "the average person, applying contemporary community standards would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest."
It's the "community standards" part, which dates even further back, to Justice William Brennan's decision in 1957's Roth v. United States, that's the stickiest of wickets. The obscenity test, which Judge Richard J. Leon has instructed Stagliano's jury to apply, remains unchanged, even though, in the four decades since Miller, cable and the Internet have redefined our concept of community. Your cable system, your phone provider and that nice Marriott you stayed at on your last business trip, after all, do brisk business bringing you naked people engaged in sexual congress. (According to one estimate, half of all hotel guests buy in-room adult movies. The road really does get lonely.)
But why go after respectable multinational businesses when there's an outspoken guy with an ass fetish out there? And that's how, in this sex-riddled day and age, John Stagliano found himself in court.
The story starts in 2005, when the Bush administration created the Obscenity Prosecution Task Force dedicated "exclusively to the protection of America's children and families through the enforcement of our Nation's obscenity laws." And enforce they have, successfully prosecuting fetish filmmakers like Max Hardcore and Ira Isaacs. But Stagliano is big game. So in December 2007, an FBI agent paid $57.48 for "Jay Sin's Milk Nymphos" and "Storm Squirters 2: Target Practice," and watched the trailer for "Fetish Fanatic 5" -- none of which, by the way, Stagliano directed. On April 8, 2008, he and his production company Evil Angel were indicted on federal obscenity charges.
In her opening statement Tuesday morning, prosecutor Bonnie Hannan told the jury, "This case is about crossing the line," saying the material in question "exceeds the bounds of decency." Court papers describe the films as containing "numerous scenes of urination, use of enemas and violent bondage. In a number of scenes, participants ingested urine and excretion from the enemas."
But while enema excretion may not be your two girls, one cup of tea, the notion of sending a guy away for something anybody with Internet access can find in under two seconds seems ludicrous -- something clearly defined as explicit content, from a man who says, "I don't want porno to be in the faces of people who don't want to see it." Yet as the Obscenity Prosecution Task Force helpfully explains, "The welfare of America's children and families demands the vigorous enforcement of obscenity statutes." Because what goes on between consenting adults over the age of 18 and is distributed to consenting adults over the age of 18 is threatening the welfare of the family and therefore a crime.
Stagliano, who has said he will take the stand on his behalf, says he thinks the FBI went after him because "maybe I am a bigger pornographer and it will have a greater impact in terms of the battle that the anti-obscenity task force is waging. If they get a victory against me it is more significant than Max Hardcore or animal sex movies or something like that." And, indeed, whatever the jury decides, Judge Leon certainly seems to have a particular inclination -- he's refused to allow testimony from a sex therapist on the films' merits, saying it "would do very little to assist the jury" and is restricting the films from being shown to the jury in their entirety, which pretty much wipes that "taken as a whole" part of the Miller test away.
Is aggressively going after Buttman going to make one of the few profitable industries left in America go away? Of course not. Even a nation founded by Puritans can never tamp down its indomitable desire to get off. But it will be interesting to see what the Obama administration does once these carryover cases from the Bush era are wrapped up. Last year, the Justice Department's move of a porn trial from Montana to New Jersey suggested a quiet push toward more free speech-friendly venues.
Stagliano has said he'll take his case to the Supreme Court if necessary. Whatever the outcome, the moment in our legal history when at last we recognize that community is now everybody with a computer, that "prurience" is in all our cable boxes and our hotel rooms -- and that civilization has somehow managed to continue to exist anyway -- may soon be upon us. Sometimes, the fight for the First Amendment comes down to a movie about milk nymphos.
Tuesday, Jul 13, 2010
"Buttman's" porn obscenity trial: Why it matters
John Stagliano faces jail time over his company's fetish films, but his court battle could redefine free speech
Mary Elizabeth Williams
John Stagliano, better known throughout his long career simply as "Buttman," is a pornographer. As a director and the head of Evil Angel pictures, he has given the world such classics as "Nudes A-Poppin 7" and "An American Buttman In London." He is a multiple Adult Video News Award winner, and easily one of the most recognized names in adult entertainment. And today, Stagliano is something else: a defendant. He's facing up to 32 years in prison and $7 million in fines, in the first adult porn obscenity case in Washington, D.C.'s U.S. District Court in over two decades. And you thought the fight against pornography died with 1986's Meese Report. Au contraire, smut-mongers.
Pornography has had its day in court before, notably in 1973's Miller v. California, which established the three criteria for a work to be deemed "obscene." Going beyond the old "I know it when I see it" test, Miller set the standard: that "the work depicts/describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by applicable state law"; that it, "taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value"; and for the kicker, that "the average person, applying contemporary community standards would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest."
It's the "community standards" part, which dates even further back, to Justice William Brennan's decision in 1957's Roth v. United States, that's the stickiest of wickets. The obscenity test, which Judge Richard J. Leon has instructed Stagliano's jury to apply, remains unchanged, even though, in the four decades since Miller, cable and the Internet have redefined our concept of community. Your cable system, your phone provider and that nice Marriott you stayed at on your last business trip, after all, do brisk business bringing you naked people engaged in sexual congress. (According to one estimate, half of all hotel guests buy in-room adult movies. The road really does get lonely.)
But why go after respectable multinational businesses when there's an outspoken guy with an ass fetish out there? And that's how, in this sex-riddled day and age, John Stagliano found himself in court.
The story starts in 2005, when the Bush administration created the Obscenity Prosecution Task Force dedicated "exclusively to the protection of America's children and families through the enforcement of our Nation's obscenity laws." And enforce they have, successfully prosecuting fetish filmmakers like Max Hardcore and Ira Isaacs. But Stagliano is big game. So in December 2007, an FBI agent paid $57.48 for "Jay Sin's Milk Nymphos" and "Storm Squirters 2: Target Practice," and watched the trailer for "Fetish Fanatic 5" -- none of which, by the way, Stagliano directed. On April 8, 2008, he and his production company Evil Angel were indicted on federal obscenity charges.
In her opening statement Tuesday morning, prosecutor Bonnie Hannan told the jury, "This case is about crossing the line," saying the material in question "exceeds the bounds of decency." Court papers describe the films as containing "numerous scenes of urination, use of enemas and violent bondage. In a number of scenes, participants ingested urine and excretion from the enemas."
But while enema excretion may not be your two girls, one cup of tea, the notion of sending a guy away for something anybody with Internet access can find in under two seconds seems ludicrous -- something clearly defined as explicit content, from a man who says, "I don't want porno to be in the faces of people who don't want to see it." Yet as the Obscenity Prosecution Task Force helpfully explains, "The welfare of America's children and families demands the vigorous enforcement of obscenity statutes." Because what goes on between consenting adults over the age of 18 and is distributed to consenting adults over the age of 18 is threatening the welfare of the family and therefore a crime.
Stagliano, who has said he will take the stand on his behalf, says he thinks the FBI went after him because "maybe I am a bigger pornographer and it will have a greater impact in terms of the battle that the anti-obscenity task force is waging. If they get a victory against me it is more significant than Max Hardcore or animal sex movies or something like that." And, indeed, whatever the jury decides, Judge Leon certainly seems to have a particular inclination -- he's refused to allow testimony from a sex therapist on the films' merits, saying it "would do very little to assist the jury" and is restricting the films from being shown to the jury in their entirety, which pretty much wipes that "taken as a whole" part of the Miller test away.
Is aggressively going after Buttman going to make one of the few profitable industries left in America go away? Of course not. Even a nation founded by Puritans can never tamp down its indomitable desire to get off. But it will be interesting to see what the Obama administration does once these carryover cases from the Bush era are wrapped up. Last year, the Justice Department's move of a porn trial from Montana to New Jersey suggested a quiet push toward more free speech-friendly venues.
Stagliano has said he'll take his case to the Supreme Court if necessary. Whatever the outcome, the moment in our legal history when at last we recognize that community is now everybody with a computer, that "prurience" is in all our cable boxes and our hotel rooms -- and that civilization has somehow managed to continue to exist anyway -- may soon be upon us. Sometimes, the fight for the First Amendment comes down to a movie about milk nymphos.
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Report: SEC staffers watched porn as economy crashed
Robalini's Note - Quick quiz, guys. You work for the SEC. Do you:
A. Try everything possible to stop the worst economic disaster since The Great Depression from happening
B. Search the Internet for lesbian videos starring Savanna Samson or Teanna Kai
Thought so. So I must defend the SEC on this one...
http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/04/23/sec.porn/
Report: SEC staffers watched porn as economy crashed
April 23, 2010
SEC employees spent hours looking at porn sites on their work computers, according to an internal report.
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
SEC investigation: Dozens of employees, contractors surfed porn sites on work computers
Staffers violated government-wide ethics rules, report finds
Report: Incidents occurred while country was teetering on verge of financial collapse
(CNN) -- As the country was sinking into its worst financial crisis in more than 70 years, Security and Exchange Commission employees and contractors cruised porn sites and viewed sexually explicit pictures using government computers, according to an agency report obtained by CNN.
"During the past five years, the SEC OIG (Office of Inspector General) substantiated that 33 SEC employees and or contractors violated Commission rules and policies, as well as the government-wide Standards of Ethical Conduct, by viewing pornographic, sexually explicit or sexually suggestive images using government computer resources and official time," said a summary of the investigation by the inspector general's office.
More than half of the workers made between $99,000 and $223,000. All the cases took place over the past five years.
"It is nothing short of disturbing that high-ranking officials within the SEC were spending more time looking at pornography than taking action to help stave off the events that brought our nation's economy to the brink of collapse," said Rep. Darrell Issa. The Republican is the ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
"This stunning report should make everyone question the wisdom of moving forward with plans to give regulators like the SEC even more widespread authority," he said. "Inexplicably, rather than exercise its existing regulatory enforcement authority, SEC officials were preoccupied with other distractions."
SEC spokesman John Nester said the employees involved have been disciplined or are being disciplined. Some have been suspended or dismissed, he said, adding that the SEC has further increased penalties for misusing government resources in recent months.
"We will not tolerate the transgressions of the very few who bring discredit to their thousands of hardworking colleagues," he said.
The investigation came to light on the same day President Obama gave a speech in lower Manhattan, calling for reform in the finance industry.
On Capitol Hill, the Senate is working on a financial reform bill that would set up regulatory oversight of the financial industry's practices with the goal of preventing another Wall Street meltdown like the one in 2008 that launched the U.S. recession.
The bill includes an "early warning" system intended to spot signs of crisis, as well as a $50 billion liquidation fund created with money from banks and other finance industry corporations to ensure an orderly transition in closing down failing entities. It was recently approved by the Senate's Banking and Agricultural committees. The House passed its version of the bill in December.
The inspector general's report includes specific examples of misuse by employees.
A regional office staff accountant tried to access pornographic websites nearly 1,800 times, using her SEC laptop during a two-week period. She also had about 600 pornographic images saved on her laptop hard drive.
Separately, a senior attorney at SEC headquarters admitted to downloading pornography up to eight hours a day, according to the investigation.
"In fact, this attorney downloaded so much pornography to his government computer that he exhausted the available space on the computer hard drive and downloaded pornography to CDs or DVDs that he accumulated in boxes in his office," the inspector general's report said.
A. Try everything possible to stop the worst economic disaster since The Great Depression from happening
B. Search the Internet for lesbian videos starring Savanna Samson or Teanna Kai
Thought so. So I must defend the SEC on this one...
http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/04/23/sec.porn/
Report: SEC staffers watched porn as economy crashed
April 23, 2010
SEC employees spent hours looking at porn sites on their work computers, according to an internal report.
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
SEC investigation: Dozens of employees, contractors surfed porn sites on work computers
Staffers violated government-wide ethics rules, report finds
Report: Incidents occurred while country was teetering on verge of financial collapse
(CNN) -- As the country was sinking into its worst financial crisis in more than 70 years, Security and Exchange Commission employees and contractors cruised porn sites and viewed sexually explicit pictures using government computers, according to an agency report obtained by CNN.
"During the past five years, the SEC OIG (Office of Inspector General) substantiated that 33 SEC employees and or contractors violated Commission rules and policies, as well as the government-wide Standards of Ethical Conduct, by viewing pornographic, sexually explicit or sexually suggestive images using government computer resources and official time," said a summary of the investigation by the inspector general's office.
More than half of the workers made between $99,000 and $223,000. All the cases took place over the past five years.
"It is nothing short of disturbing that high-ranking officials within the SEC were spending more time looking at pornography than taking action to help stave off the events that brought our nation's economy to the brink of collapse," said Rep. Darrell Issa. The Republican is the ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
"This stunning report should make everyone question the wisdom of moving forward with plans to give regulators like the SEC even more widespread authority," he said. "Inexplicably, rather than exercise its existing regulatory enforcement authority, SEC officials were preoccupied with other distractions."
SEC spokesman John Nester said the employees involved have been disciplined or are being disciplined. Some have been suspended or dismissed, he said, adding that the SEC has further increased penalties for misusing government resources in recent months.
"We will not tolerate the transgressions of the very few who bring discredit to their thousands of hardworking colleagues," he said.
The investigation came to light on the same day President Obama gave a speech in lower Manhattan, calling for reform in the finance industry.
On Capitol Hill, the Senate is working on a financial reform bill that would set up regulatory oversight of the financial industry's practices with the goal of preventing another Wall Street meltdown like the one in 2008 that launched the U.S. recession.
The bill includes an "early warning" system intended to spot signs of crisis, as well as a $50 billion liquidation fund created with money from banks and other finance industry corporations to ensure an orderly transition in closing down failing entities. It was recently approved by the Senate's Banking and Agricultural committees. The House passed its version of the bill in December.
The inspector general's report includes specific examples of misuse by employees.
A regional office staff accountant tried to access pornographic websites nearly 1,800 times, using her SEC laptop during a two-week period. She also had about 600 pornographic images saved on her laptop hard drive.
Separately, a senior attorney at SEC headquarters admitted to downloading pornography up to eight hours a day, according to the investigation.
"In fact, this attorney downloaded so much pornography to his government computer that he exhausted the available space on the computer hard drive and downloaded pornography to CDs or DVDs that he accumulated in boxes in his office," the inspector general's report said.
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Adult Star Ron Jeremy Talks Porn at CES
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2357912,00.asp
Adult Star Ron Jeremy Talks Porn at CES
01.08.10
by Brian Heater
LAS VEGAS - "Porn King" Ron Jeremy brought a little bit of the AVN Adult Entertainment Expo to the Las Vegas Convention Center and the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) Friday for a debate on the ins and outs of pornography in the age of the Internet.
Jeremy and Craig Gross, an anti-pornography media activist, faced off for "The Great Porn Debate," though the event was really more a light-hearted discussion.
Jeremy kicked off his opening remarks by referring to pornography as entertainment, not unlike football games. "World of sport versus world of spurts," he joked to the groans of the crowd."
"Porn is a cheap substitute for sex," countered Gross. "[It] has become [childrens'] sex ed. It's a false expectation."
Jeremy insisted that the industry only caters to the over-18 crowd. "We don't want kids to watch porn," he told the crowd. Though if they do, he added, there are far worse influences out there — like video games. "[Studies have] found that violent video games are much bigger a negative influence on kids."
Gross, on the other hand, argued that even while the porn industry may not be targeting children specifically, the Internet has made adult content nearly ubiquitous.
"The Internet has changed the game completely. What we used to have to work hard to find, you now have to work hard to avoid," Gross said.
The filtering, Jeremy argued, should be up to the parents. "Parents better start to learn the Internet," Jeremy said.
Gross, it seems, agreed with the sentiment, telling the crowd, "For the most part, kids are smarter about technology than their parents. That has to change."
Gross did, however, happily take a shot at Jeremy's own tech savvy, adding, "Ron uses a fax machine. If you want to get a hold of him, you have to send him a fax."
Adult Star Ron Jeremy Talks Porn at CES
01.08.10
by Brian Heater
LAS VEGAS - "Porn King" Ron Jeremy brought a little bit of the AVN Adult Entertainment Expo to the Las Vegas Convention Center and the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) Friday for a debate on the ins and outs of pornography in the age of the Internet.
Jeremy and Craig Gross, an anti-pornography media activist, faced off for "The Great Porn Debate," though the event was really more a light-hearted discussion.
Jeremy kicked off his opening remarks by referring to pornography as entertainment, not unlike football games. "World of sport versus world of spurts," he joked to the groans of the crowd."
"Porn is a cheap substitute for sex," countered Gross. "[It] has become [childrens'] sex ed. It's a false expectation."
Jeremy insisted that the industry only caters to the over-18 crowd. "We don't want kids to watch porn," he told the crowd. Though if they do, he added, there are far worse influences out there — like video games. "[Studies have] found that violent video games are much bigger a negative influence on kids."
Gross, on the other hand, argued that even while the porn industry may not be targeting children specifically, the Internet has made adult content nearly ubiquitous.
"The Internet has changed the game completely. What we used to have to work hard to find, you now have to work hard to avoid," Gross said.
The filtering, Jeremy argued, should be up to the parents. "Parents better start to learn the Internet," Jeremy said.
Gross, it seems, agreed with the sentiment, telling the crowd, "For the most part, kids are smarter about technology than their parents. That has to change."
Gross did, however, happily take a shot at Jeremy's own tech savvy, adding, "Ron uses a fax machine. If you want to get a hold of him, you have to send him a fax."
Friday, November 20, 2009
The Porn Star and the Politician
http://www.marieclaire.com/world-reports/news/latest/stormy-daniels-louisiana-senateThe Porn Star and the Politician
By Christy Smith
STORMY DANIELS, a 30-year-old adult film star with more than 150 steamy flicks to her name, is getting set to heat up Louisiana's 2010 Senate race. Daniels, the star of Operation Desert Stormy—in which she plays a CIA agent who fights terrorists while wearing Army-fatigue booty shorts—says she plans to toss her G-string in the ring (although she hadn't officially announced her candidacy as of press time). We asked the Baton Rouge native why she wants to forgo porn for politics.
Q: Why shoot for the Senate?
A: I was drafted by a group called Draft Stormy, a grassroots movement in Louisiana that wanted someone who was the polar opposite of current senator David Vitter. They figured I would be perfect because I am open and honest about my sexuality, unlike Vitter. I realized that this is my chance to make a difference, to do something unselfish, noble, and to help a lot of people.
Q: You're referring to Senator Vitter's link to a Washington, D.C. escort service . . .
A: I'm not one to judge someone's sexual activity, but what annoys me is that he's so hard-core "family values," and he puts his wife and kids out there, saying he's a Christian family man. Then he's caught up in a prostitution scandal. He's a hypocrite.
Q: How much will your résumé be a factor?
A: It's actually starting to work in my favor—I have nothing to hide. A sex tape of me isn't going to pop up and shame me; there are 150 of them at the video store.
Q: Do you think you're more qualified than Senator Vitter?
A: Absolutely not. But in one movie, I did play a Secret Service agent marooned on an island controlled by North Korea. I butt heads with dictator Kim Jong-il and come out on top.
Q: What's the most important issue facing Louisiana today?
A: The biggest issue in Louisiana is the economy. In New Orleans, tourism is down, and the crime rate is up. I want to make Louisiana a better place to live—create jobs, rebuild the Gulf Coast, and make health care affordable.
Q: What's your party affiliation?
A: As far as the two-party political system goes, I swing both ways. But I'm leaning toward the Libertarian Party.
Q: Sarah Palin or Hillary Clinton?
A: Hillary Clinton. She's a well-rounded woman, extremely knowledgeable on a wide range of subjects, and carries herself with dignity.
Q: Your campaign adviser's car was bombed in July, although he wasn't in the car. Was this politically motivated?
A: I hope so. I hope someone is that afraid or interested in what I'm doing that they would try to scare me out of the race.
Q: If you're elected, will you quit porn?
A: Probably, but only because of HD...and gravity.
Thursday, October 9, 2008
Coming Soon: A Sarah Palin Porno
http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2008/10/coming_soon_the_sarah_palin_po.htmlComing Soon: A Sarah Palin Porno
10/1/08
Jessica Pressler
It was only a matter of time. Last night, someone sent us an ad from Craigslist L.A., supposedly placed by porn producers searching for a Sarah Palin lookalike for an upcoming skin flick. It's since been removed (perhaps they were able to cast Eva Angelina?), but here is the original text for your edification.
Sarah Palin look-alike for an adult film to be shot in next 10 days. Major adult studio. Please send pix, stats etc. ASAP Pay: $2000-3000 No anal required.
Obviously, this is disgusting and horrific, and we must demand that Vivid counter by producing a porno starring a Joe Biden lookalike immediately for parity. But also we're intrigued — by the no-anal clause, of course, and the title potential. Our tipster suggested Impalin' Sarah: The Pork She Couldn't Say "No Thanks" To, but we think they'll probably go with Drill Baby Drill.
Thursday, February 28, 2008
How To Keep A Porn Marriage Rock Hard
This summary is not available. Please
click here to view the post.
Sunday, January 13, 2008
Porn Providers Rethinking Next-Gen DVD Plans
Robalini's Note: Who would've guess the battle for for DVD standards would turn on "Jenna Haze Oil Orgy"?
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2704,2247595,00.asp
Porn Providers Rethinking Next-Gen DVD Plans
01.10.08
by Chloe Albanesius
LAS VEGAS—The adult film industry is still taking a wait-and-see approach to the Blu-ray /HD DVD wars. But while Blu-ray's perceived costs have pushed some companies into the arms of the HD DVD camp, Warner Bros.' decision last week to exclusively support Blu-ray has some thinking that the end of HD DVD is nigh.
Executives in the adult-film industry spoke Wednesday during the opening day of the AVN Adult Entertainment Expo 2008, which briefly overlaps with the more mainstream Consumer Electronics Show ending Thursday.
"It could be a real sign that things will shift," Jeff Thill, director of video operations for the Hustler Video Group, said about the Warner decision. Thill said he sees no advantage of one format over the other, but is "leaning Blu-Ray" after Warner's announcement.
The Blu-ray camp, led by Sony, has been fighting Toshiba and its HD DVD format for years in a battle reminiscent of the VHS versus Betamax battle. In that fight, Betamax maker Sony's refusal to work with the porn industry helped usher in a VHS victory when the adult industry capitalized on the burgeoning popularity of VCRs and video rentals.
Hustler had some success recently with the Blu-ray release of Jenna Haze Oil Orgy, said Thill, who was on hand to showcase Hustler's latest releases at the annual AVN Adult Entertainment Expo.
The company packaged the "Jenna" disc with an HD DVD and standard version in case users had trouble with Blu-ray, but has thus far not received any complaints. In March, Hustler will release its latest "Barely Legal" DVD in the Blu-ray format, he said.
Hustler has released two titles using the HD DVD format, Thill said. The company expects to release between 15 to 25 high-definition videos in 2008, most of which will probably be Blu-ray, Thill said.
Blu-ray is "a little bit of a headache" because of royalty fees, but it's "six of one, a half dozen of the other" with the format wars, he said. Blu-Ray also "sounds sexier," according to Thill, and there's "an important base in the gaming world" because the popular PlayStation 3 runs Blu-Ray while Microsoft has released an optional HD DVD drive for its Xbox 360 console, Thill said.
Vivid Entertainment, home to porn star Jenna Jameson, has also released videos on Blu-ray and HD, said David Peskin, Vivid's national sales manager. It currently has two Blu-ray titles and three HD DVD titles on the shelves.
Vivid was initially "conservative" with its high-definition re-order numbers, but is "starting to stock a little heavier" since sales have been promising, Peskin said. Vivid has seen Blu-ray sell more units online while HD does better in retail stores, he said.
The company doesn't yet have a format preference. "Both have surpassed expectations," he said, though Peskin also pointed to the PlayStation 3 connection as a plus for Blu-ray.
Some companies have had to bypass Blu-ray altogether. Jackie Ramos, vice president of DVD production for Wicked Pictures, "looked to Blu-ray" when the company was first exploring high-definition about a year ago, but had trouble finding a provider that would produce Blu-ray discs for the adult industry.
Wicked has since released about a half dozen HD DVD titles, but Ramos managed to track down some porn-friendly Blu-ray producers and is now "aggressively" looking at those options.
With the Warner decision, things are "a little more serious," Ramos said, and, to him, it makes sense to examine Blu-Ray should it become the industry standard.
Ramos also had concerns about the Blu-ray price point. There's a copyright aspect you can't get around with Blu-Ray, whereas HD DVD allows you to choose whether or not you want that copyright protection, he said. "With adult industry, HD DVD was friendlier price wise."
Ramos expects to select a Blu-ray producer in the next few weeks and hopes to release Wicked's first Blu-ray title in the next few months, he said. But he was not convinced that the porn industry was driving the debate as it did with VHS and Betamax.
"What really drives it is the availability of players" and what the consumers want, Ramos said. HD capitalized on that by selling cheaper players, but now that many of the major studios have jumped on the Blu-Ray bandwagon, "we'll have to see," Ramos said.
Albert Lazarito, vice president of Silver Sinema, also believes the consumer is key to winning the DVD battle. "With the Warner Brothers decision, the market will direct the outcome," he said. Lazarito is "more than confident that it won't be the adult realm" that selects a final DVD format.
Silver Sinema has been filming in HD because Blu-ray is too expensive, Lazarito said, but his company is "ready to go depending on how the market shifts."
Pink Visual was also turned off by the cost of Blu-ray, explained director of marketing Kim Kysar. "HD DVD was affordable; it was doable. Blu-ray was too expensive," she said.
Pink Visual will release its first HD-DVD video next week.
"Everybody's going to want to have both options," Kysar said. "Blu-Ray could be the next step, but not if nobody uses it and it stays too cost prohibitive."
Kysar also expressed concern about how much the camera would capture in high-definition, a sentiment echoed by Lazarito.
"Imperfections are modified," Lazarito said.
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2704,2247595,00.asp
Porn Providers Rethinking Next-Gen DVD Plans
01.10.08
by Chloe Albanesius
LAS VEGAS—The adult film industry is still taking a wait-and-see approach to the Blu-ray /HD DVD wars. But while Blu-ray's perceived costs have pushed some companies into the arms of the HD DVD camp, Warner Bros.' decision last week to exclusively support Blu-ray has some thinking that the end of HD DVD is nigh.
Executives in the adult-film industry spoke Wednesday during the opening day of the AVN Adult Entertainment Expo 2008, which briefly overlaps with the more mainstream Consumer Electronics Show ending Thursday.
"It could be a real sign that things will shift," Jeff Thill, director of video operations for the Hustler Video Group, said about the Warner decision. Thill said he sees no advantage of one format over the other, but is "leaning Blu-Ray" after Warner's announcement.
The Blu-ray camp, led by Sony, has been fighting Toshiba and its HD DVD format for years in a battle reminiscent of the VHS versus Betamax battle. In that fight, Betamax maker Sony's refusal to work with the porn industry helped usher in a VHS victory when the adult industry capitalized on the burgeoning popularity of VCRs and video rentals.
Hustler had some success recently with the Blu-ray release of Jenna Haze Oil Orgy, said Thill, who was on hand to showcase Hustler's latest releases at the annual AVN Adult Entertainment Expo.
The company packaged the "Jenna" disc with an HD DVD and standard version in case users had trouble with Blu-ray, but has thus far not received any complaints. In March, Hustler will release its latest "Barely Legal" DVD in the Blu-ray format, he said.
Hustler has released two titles using the HD DVD format, Thill said. The company expects to release between 15 to 25 high-definition videos in 2008, most of which will probably be Blu-ray, Thill said.
Blu-ray is "a little bit of a headache" because of royalty fees, but it's "six of one, a half dozen of the other" with the format wars, he said. Blu-Ray also "sounds sexier," according to Thill, and there's "an important base in the gaming world" because the popular PlayStation 3 runs Blu-Ray while Microsoft has released an optional HD DVD drive for its Xbox 360 console, Thill said.
Vivid Entertainment, home to porn star Jenna Jameson, has also released videos on Blu-ray and HD, said David Peskin, Vivid's national sales manager. It currently has two Blu-ray titles and three HD DVD titles on the shelves.
Vivid was initially "conservative" with its high-definition re-order numbers, but is "starting to stock a little heavier" since sales have been promising, Peskin said. Vivid has seen Blu-ray sell more units online while HD does better in retail stores, he said.
The company doesn't yet have a format preference. "Both have surpassed expectations," he said, though Peskin also pointed to the PlayStation 3 connection as a plus for Blu-ray.
Some companies have had to bypass Blu-ray altogether. Jackie Ramos, vice president of DVD production for Wicked Pictures, "looked to Blu-ray" when the company was first exploring high-definition about a year ago, but had trouble finding a provider that would produce Blu-ray discs for the adult industry.
Wicked has since released about a half dozen HD DVD titles, but Ramos managed to track down some porn-friendly Blu-ray producers and is now "aggressively" looking at those options.
With the Warner decision, things are "a little more serious," Ramos said, and, to him, it makes sense to examine Blu-Ray should it become the industry standard.
Ramos also had concerns about the Blu-ray price point. There's a copyright aspect you can't get around with Blu-Ray, whereas HD DVD allows you to choose whether or not you want that copyright protection, he said. "With adult industry, HD DVD was friendlier price wise."
Ramos expects to select a Blu-ray producer in the next few weeks and hopes to release Wicked's first Blu-ray title in the next few months, he said. But he was not convinced that the porn industry was driving the debate as it did with VHS and Betamax.
"What really drives it is the availability of players" and what the consumers want, Ramos said. HD capitalized on that by selling cheaper players, but now that many of the major studios have jumped on the Blu-Ray bandwagon, "we'll have to see," Ramos said.
Albert Lazarito, vice president of Silver Sinema, also believes the consumer is key to winning the DVD battle. "With the Warner Brothers decision, the market will direct the outcome," he said. Lazarito is "more than confident that it won't be the adult realm" that selects a final DVD format.
Silver Sinema has been filming in HD because Blu-ray is too expensive, Lazarito said, but his company is "ready to go depending on how the market shifts."
Pink Visual was also turned off by the cost of Blu-ray, explained director of marketing Kim Kysar. "HD DVD was affordable; it was doable. Blu-ray was too expensive," she said.
Pink Visual will release its first HD-DVD video next week.
"Everybody's going to want to have both options," Kysar said. "Blu-Ray could be the next step, but not if nobody uses it and it stays too cost prohibitive."
Kysar also expressed concern about how much the camera would capture in high-definition, a sentiment echoed by Lazarito.
"Imperfections are modified," Lazarito said.
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