Strippers, Rappers and VR Porn: Welcome to Internext
The annual bacchanalia that is the Adult Video News Entertainment Expo concluded on Saturday, January 24th, after a week-long, raunchy bender in Las Vegas. But while the starlets on the red carpet at the awards show, the Oscars of skin, got most of the attention, there were other players quietly cutting deals down the hall at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino — all courtesy of the AVN-sponsored Internext, a convention for the geeks and moguls of online porn.
We all know that the Internet was made for “adult entertainment,” but that begs the question: who really made the ‘net? The answer: this crew. Much of the infrastructure we take for granted online – streaming video, credit card processing, affiliate marketing – was either invented or popularized first so surfers could get their naughty bits. Amid all the gloomy talk about Google banning adult site ads and so-called “Tube” sites letting the NSFW crowd stream all manner of sex clips for free, the digerati of porn hit their parties hard, and their hype harder. Here’s what you missed, for better and worse, during the World Wide Web’s wild-west event:
Rappers (and Strippers)
So much for the online porn recession. The who’s-who of dot-cum moguls raged on at the House of Slam, an invite-only private bash at the Vinyl club at the Hard Rock. DMX and B-Real performed as over 50 exotic dancers worked the stage and the crowd, as heavy-breathing heavy hitters sucked down Tito’s and tonics while scanning for potential models. The MC of the night? Kevin Blatt, the self-described “accidental pornographer” who brokered the Paris Hilton sex tape (among others). “Everyone says there’s no more money in online porn!” Blatt told the crowd, “but I see a lot of money makers right here!”
Little People (and Strippers)
Upstairs at 3 a.m., webmasters and mistresses piled into a sprawling suite for a scene that one exuberant geek described/shouted in my ear as “midgets and strippers!” But the reality was a lot more sad. The little people stuck to the couch as they nursed their Stellas through the holes in their Slipknot masks. Over at the duckpin bowling lane by the bar, the strippers took turns exaggerating their ball handling skills, as a few dozen geeks cheered on. Next stop: Comic-Con.
Cam-girls
It’s no wonder the keynote speaker at Internext was the guy who runs LiveJasmin, one of the most popular cam sites online. With piracy taking a bit out of the business, savvy pornstars and makers get their cash the bootleg-free way: by charging voyeurs by the minute to watch them strip and get down online. Taking the stage at one party, all-American cam-girl Sarah Peachez taunted the party goers one night by teasing them that, “You aren’t ready for my fat ass!” In fact, they were. But the job can be injury prone. One cam-girl said she masturbates so long that she now sleeps in wrist splints.
Virtual Reality
The wackiest innovation on the horizon? Yes, it’s VR porn. With Oculus Rift, the virtual reality gear, getting ready to go wide, the time to finally jack in (and get off) might finally be upon us. Vancouver-based Utherverse Digital, makes of what they call a “3D social network,” RedLightCenter.com, have created a kind of triple-X Second Life, in which players chat with each other — and hump pixels.
The Zuckerberg of Porn
Web moguls and hangers-on watched the NFL playoffs in style inside a 15,000 square-foot Vegas hills mansion, complete with a bowling alley, a beer pong room, a dance floor, and an infinity pool overlooking the Strip. If there’s the king of new Wild West Web, it’s Rick Muenyong, the whiz kid mogul of the adult business online who built and rules this palace. Muenyong, a soft-spoken, clean-cut Tiger Woods look-a-like, made millions with his review site, The Best Porn. Now he’s launching MyPorn, which he hopes will be the iTunes to the Napster-like free sites that are cannibalizing the business. “I know what consumers want,” Muenyong joked, as he demoed his site, “I jerk off too!”