INTERNET The gamble of the century

Author: Wang Dequan
Publisher:
Publish Date: 1999-09-11
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Excerpt: Chapter 17, Commercialization of Online Pornography You can skip this chapter, but you have a responsibility to your children.
Where is "Playboy"? Pornography is not legal in many countries, and it is even targeted for suppression in China. We will discuss the control of "online pornography" and its social impact in detail later. Here, we associate the business opportunities of the Internet with pornography. The author is certainly not risking public disapproval by offering advice to midnight ladies or providing new entertainment for lechers. To be precise, there is no real business opportunity here (unless you interpret it that way), but the author was unsure where to place this topic and decided to introduce it here. In reality, "online pornography" is a seemingly alarming term, but it is not as frightening as people imagine. The content is quite broad, of course, depending on the tolerance limits of different social backgrounds. We must emphasize again that the Internet is global, and in many cases, you should not overreact. If you spend a lot of time wandering in the electronic space, you will soon discover that a significant number of Internet users firmly believe that pornography and computers are a natural match, just like social transformation and official corruption. They love discussing sex and appreciating pornographic photos. Imagine that there are so many universities across the country offering Internet services to students, and the vast majority of them are male students. Therefore, it is not difficult to imagine the main readership of this content. In news discussion groups, besides technical topics, the second most common topic is sex. Online sex projects include personal ads, stories, and an astonishing number of large pornographic images, ranging from mild stimulation to deep obscenity. With the development of multimedia technology, it has evolved from static to dynamic, from silent to, and from one-way communication to simultaneous interaction, keeping up with the times. The most eye-catching parts of magazines like "Playboy" and "Penthouse" are all available here, and you can access them for free with no age restrictions. Children who use the Internet should be supervised by parents to help them make choices, but this is often not the case. Many parents are completely unaware of the computer's such uses. Once they discover that their 12-year-old daughter is staring intently at the scenes on the screen, they are likely to be stunned, their heads spinning, and their bodies trembling. Most commercial Internet services designate special areas specifically for sex-related projects and discussions, and access to these areas typically requires special permission. Although there are many free pornographic products on the Internet, a significant portion of them are actually provided by businesses seeking profit. Chat lines are channels on the Internet that allow people to exchange opinions in real-time. They have now been filled with pornographic conversations, sexual innuendos, and role-playing scenarios involving sex fantasies. In these areas of the electronic space, there is usually no monitoring or management, and anything goes. Of course, these virtual brothels or singles' bars do not involve physical contact, and the concept of "safe sex" may be realized in its ultimate form here. In our domestic networks, such scenes have not evolved to this extreme. We tend to be gentle and subtle, often exploring the cultural meaning of "sex." The deleted parts of the abridged version of "Jin Ping Mei" and the complete version of "Rou Pu Tuan" have been repeatedly copied and even printed and circulated among enthusiasts. The square brackets in the folk-circulated "True History of the Wild Goose" and "Green Field Fairy" have also turned into vivid text on the network. Regardless of the significance of banning these ancient classics, objectively, they are indeed freely circulating, and it seems no one cares. Internet pornography and "online red-light districts" are private electronic bulletin boards that can be considered a distant relative of Usenet without any genetic connection. Many electronic bulletin boards actually exist in a garage or basement computer of a single household, but they are still part of the Internet. Other types of electronic bulletin boards are also connected via modems, but unlike the Internet, they can only establish one-to-one connections, not multiple interconnections on a large network. The second-largest electronic bulletin board in the United States is called "Pornographic Patterns Network." Although some electronic bulletin boards are free, most are not, at least not free; they charge based on actual connection time. A computer magazine ran four full-page advertisements for electronic bulletin boards in one issue, such as "Sexy Software," "Free Adult DVDs," "Online Hookups," "Adults' Playground," and "Online Lifestyle, Hot Chat with the World's Most Sexy Singles or Partners." Globally, billions of gigabytes of storage space are used to store information that many people consider essential to the psychological well-being of Internet communities. Internet sex and various online services have attracted significant attention from the media. A nine-year-old child can start exploring nude images of men and women with just a few simple key presses. Children often receive this unexpected education in ways that their parents are not happy about. A typical message recently posted on the "alt.sex" news discussion group is as follows: Adult positions open, offering you many free images. Interested parties, just send your email address to get more details. Please remember you must be over 21. But yeah, forget it anyway, no one cares. The dirty advertisements on the Internet have drawn the attention of judicial authorities in various countries, and users addicted to such materials have also learned how to avoid leaving traces. Large amounts of pornographic products are secretly transmitted worldwide via the Internet, hidden in encrypted files. Encrypted files are those composed of special codes, and they can only be read with the corresponding key. Due to advancements in encryption technology, law enforcement agencies have very limited capabilities in tracking and preventing the spread of obscene information. To discuss online pornography, one cannot avoid mentioning a special computer in Finland, generally known as an "anonymous server." If you frequently visit Usenet, you may have seen some messages with personal addresses labeled "ann penetf:" attached to them. You might wonder why so many people interested in sex come from this area. In reality, they don't. Anyone anywhere can send a message to an anonymous server address, request an anonymous user name, and then send out emails or Usenet messages while hiding their real identity. This Finnish computer removes the sender's address, and only it knows the actual source. If someone wants to reply to a message from an anonymous user, they can send the message to the anonymous server address, and the Finnish computer will forward it to the correct recipient. It is almost impossible to identify who is using the anonymous server. This arrangement is perfect for those who want to keep their interests deeply hidden in the dark. An example of sex as a marketing product on the Internet was discovered by chance. There is an address called "CyberSexCity," and when you enter it, the screen displays the following message: Welcome to CyberSexCity. This server publishes advertisements for all types of computer sex, most of which are bizarre commercial sex ads for those even more perverted than you. For fairness, we must mention that all users entering this address will see a warning: The data on this server is extremely thorough in terms of sex. The advertisers on this server offer all the types of perverted materials you have ever heard of, and even more. For those with orthodox political attitudes, we suggest you, CyberSexCity is not the place for you. Please believe us, and also, if you are under 18, stay away. Then, it lists explicit personal advertisements related to sex and the methods to contact the advertisers, of course, for a fee. Besides electronic bulletin boards, the vast majority of sex-related products on the Internet are free. A large number of pornographic images flying around is one example. Of course, it is undeniable that some people have made fortunes by selling various obscene products. For years, many national newspapers have openly sold all kinds of sex-related products in their classified ads and premium-rate phone services. Currently, most goods on the market can be easily modified and marketed on the Internet, guaranteed to be in high demand. Some of these products are harmless and purely for fun, while others should be considered in terms of legal and public tolerance limits. Hosting a party on the Internet could also be an interesting experience. You can easily create a database with search criteria based on personal interests, physical features, etc. Each participant can provide photos and upload them to the Internet for others to view. Interested individuals can search the database for potential matches, contact them via email, or arrange online meetings using chat lines. All that is needed is to assign an email address to each potential romantic protagonist. Stories about meeting and marrying online have also been widely reported.