Porn gets a lot of credit for pushing technology forward. You probably owe your DVD player and your video-on-demand service to dedicated porn fans with discretionary income. But as web technology evolves to support true personalization and community — into Web 2.0 — porn is falling further behind the curve.
Like content was king in the 1990s, in the days of Web 2.0, community is the kingdom.
Community is all about interactivity and personalization. Given the interactive nature of sex and the personal nature of porn, you’d think adult sites would be all over Web 2.0. But with a few notable exceptions, they’re not. And I think this is going to bite them in the ass not too far into the future if they don’t catch up.
For the porn industry, which is at least as paranoid about piracy as the Recording Industry Association of America, allowing open data formats that let users to do with content what they will does not come naturally.
But Jason Tucker of No Rivals Media (NSFW), which builds interactive sites for adult webmasters, makes a compelling business case for why adult webmasters should keep pace with the mainstream.
PornWolf writes on GFY: "No matter what you may personally think about them, this article shows that it pays to get to know journalists."
Mutt writes: "There are plenty of Web 2.0 porn sites and the one thing they all have in common is that they are running on 100% stolen content – oh two things in common, they all are supported by AFF [AdultFriendFinder]. To be fair there are some very old porn sites that were Web 2.0 long before some geek fag invented the term."
PornWolf writes: "This is true. But it’s also true that we haven’t really added anything to the technology in the last few years. Even ABC and Fox leapfrogged us in their method of online video delivery and monetization. How did that happen?"
RawAlex posts: "AFF and the dating sites are "web2.0" in many ways, because they are the ones making the money when the porn is stolen. Only companies with nothing to be "user generated" make any money in web2.0 land."
