XXX marks the G Spot
The G Spot, that is, the Gold Spot, of porn has been located. At the very least, the new ruling permitting .XXX domain names should give a big boost to the domain registry business.
For consumers the existence of the .XXX domain means the industry will identify itself online and make it easier for those who want to avoid it to do so. Meanwhile, with so much free porn on the internet, the profitability of porm is in question. How does the industry make money? The country has not reached the point where mainstream sellers of goods and services are advertising on porn sites. Who knows? Maybe we're in for a change.
Pornography Sites Will Be Allowed to Use .XXX Addresses
March 18, 2011
SAN FRANCISCO — The agency governing Internet addresses on Friday approved the creation of a new red-light district on the Web, but the decision may not end years of fighting over the contentious plan.
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers authorized the creation of an .xxx suffix for pornography Web sites. The decision was immediately slammed by some of the sex industry’s biggest names.
Industry members say they fear they could be subject to arbitrary censorship by governments and even by a new board overseeing the dot-xxx domain. They also say the plan would unfairly force existing pornography sites to register their sister domain names ending in xxx to prevent other businesses from using the names.
“Our industry is unanimously opposed,” said Diane Duke, executive director of the Free Speech Coalition, a trade association representing more than 1,000 pornography businesses. Ms. Duke said that she expected the association’s members, which include companies like Hustler and Adam & Eve, to continue to use dot-com addresses. She also said the association was considering its legal options.
The dot-xxx registry was also opposed by some religious groups, who feared that the new domain would lead to the further spread of pornography on the Internet.
The decision is a big win for ICM Registry, a Florida-based company that first applied for the dot-xxx domain in 2004. ICM will oversee the domain and profit from it. Its chief executive, Stuart Lawley, dismissed his detractors.
“The opposition has been very small and very vocal,” he said. “It has been completely overblown.”
He said sites in the dot-xxx domains would be scanned daily for viruses and would be offered a payment-processing system that customers would be able to trust.
“Everybody wins,” said Mr. Lawley. “The consumer of adult sites wins. The providers will benefit because more people will become paying customers. And those who don’t want to go there will win as well, because the sites will be easier to filter.”
Mr. Lawley said tens of thousands of businesses had already reserved some 200,000 dot-xxx domains. Each registration will cost $60 a year.
Peter Dengate Thrush, the chairman of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers board, said in an interview that the vote vindicated the accountability of his organization. The corporation had originally opposed the application by ICM Registry in 2007. But after ICM appealed, the organization tentatively reversed that vote in June, and said that its decision to give the project a green light was made purely on technical grounds.
“This is a test of our accountability mechanisms,” Mr. Thrush said. “In the end, I think the system was able to cope with a contentious matter. We are trying to build a self-regulating industry, and this is self-regulation at work.”
Mr. Thrush said that some established Web sites probably opposed the new dot-xxx domains for business reasons.
“We heard from a number of them that they didn’t want it,” Mr. Thrush said. “The board wasn’t persuaded by their arguments. They are incumbents, and they are trying to oppose a new entrant.”
Nine board members voted to approve the registry, and three voted against it.
For consumers the existence of the .XXX domain means the industry will identify itself online and make it easier for those who want to avoid it to do so. Meanwhile, with so much free porn on the internet, the profitability of porm is in question. How does the industry make money? The country has not reached the point where mainstream sellers of goods and services are advertising on porn sites. Who knows? Maybe we're in for a change.
Pornography Sites Will Be Allowed to Use .XXX Addresses
March 18, 2011
SAN FRANCISCO — The agency governing Internet addresses on Friday approved the creation of a new red-light district on the Web, but the decision may not end years of fighting over the contentious plan.
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers authorized the creation of an .xxx suffix for pornography Web sites. The decision was immediately slammed by some of the sex industry’s biggest names.
Industry members say they fear they could be subject to arbitrary censorship by governments and even by a new board overseeing the dot-xxx domain. They also say the plan would unfairly force existing pornography sites to register their sister domain names ending in xxx to prevent other businesses from using the names.
“Our industry is unanimously opposed,” said Diane Duke, executive director of the Free Speech Coalition, a trade association representing more than 1,000 pornography businesses. Ms. Duke said that she expected the association’s members, which include companies like Hustler and Adam & Eve, to continue to use dot-com addresses. She also said the association was considering its legal options.
The dot-xxx registry was also opposed by some religious groups, who feared that the new domain would lead to the further spread of pornography on the Internet.
The decision is a big win for ICM Registry, a Florida-based company that first applied for the dot-xxx domain in 2004. ICM will oversee the domain and profit from it. Its chief executive, Stuart Lawley, dismissed his detractors.
“The opposition has been very small and very vocal,” he said. “It has been completely overblown.”
He said sites in the dot-xxx domains would be scanned daily for viruses and would be offered a payment-processing system that customers would be able to trust.
“Everybody wins,” said Mr. Lawley. “The consumer of adult sites wins. The providers will benefit because more people will become paying customers. And those who don’t want to go there will win as well, because the sites will be easier to filter.”
Mr. Lawley said tens of thousands of businesses had already reserved some 200,000 dot-xxx domains. Each registration will cost $60 a year.
Peter Dengate Thrush, the chairman of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers board, said in an interview that the vote vindicated the accountability of his organization. The corporation had originally opposed the application by ICM Registry in 2007. But after ICM appealed, the organization tentatively reversed that vote in June, and said that its decision to give the project a green light was made purely on technical grounds.
“This is a test of our accountability mechanisms,” Mr. Thrush said. “In the end, I think the system was able to cope with a contentious matter. We are trying to build a self-regulating industry, and this is self-regulation at work.”
Mr. Thrush said that some established Web sites probably opposed the new dot-xxx domains for business reasons.
“We heard from a number of them that they didn’t want it,” Mr. Thrush said. “The board wasn’t persuaded by their arguments. They are incumbents, and they are trying to oppose a new entrant.”
Nine board members voted to approve the registry, and three voted against it.
Labels: domain names, domain registry, porn, xxx
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